Oops. I have no clue if anyone is actually reading this story, because my few reviewers may have given up on me, but here's my update. It's way, way late, but everyone says that, so don't believe me. There's no excuse. I just didn't update, is all.
Anyways, here it is. Enjoy it.
StarDrop ;)
Dust settled, and Mal performed a quick head count. Zoe. There was Kaylee, supporting a dizzy-looking Simon, but they didn't look seriously hurt. There was River, and there was Jayne.
Jayne was hunched over, and Mal was sure at first that he'd been hit, but no. He was staring in horror at a fragmented mess of metal at his feet, and Mal assembled it in his mind. A gun. A broken gun.
"Who's missing?" Mal called out, and Zoe scanned the area.
"No one, sir. We're all here. Uh, Jayne…"
"She's broken!" Jayne wailed, and Mal, bemused, peered closer at the splinters of metal and recognized Jayne's favorite handgun, a 56-tac Callister relock, one that he'd taken from an old enemy a while ago, a preference with him.
"Um… Jayne? You do realize you're calling a lifeless object she?" Kaylee piped up, and Jayne, not one to cross Kaylee, said only, "My favorite handgun… Susan…"
"You named a gun Susan?" The crew said incredulously, all in one, and Mal remembered Jayne's habit for naming his weapons, like Ana the fletched-spider knife and Lilly the semiautomatic-tac rifle. (Not to overlook Vera, his very favorite gun.)
"She ain't just any gun, ya know!" Jayne protested. "She's a 56-tac Callister relock with automatic targeting system and extra-wide trigger with a hairpin sensor. She's a great gun."
"I think you mean she was, Jayne," Mal said solemnly, trying desperately not to laugh. "She's dead, Jayne. Should we make a grave?"
"He screamed," River earnestly said, "He doesn't want to tell you, but it was him."
"You were the one that screamed? Really?" Mal was extremely interested. "You screamed because your little gun got broken?"
Jayne pulled in his shoulders, still looking grumpily at the shards of his handgun. "I got hit on the hand," he said sulkily. "You woulda screamed too."
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Back on the boat, Simon, after treating a slight concussion that had occurred when his head collided painfully with rock (River had given him a shove out of the way of Patience, but he really didn't have any balance, and had tripped on a stone) determined that Jayne hadn't actually been shot on the hand at all.
"He's just been nicked," He said to the cheerful crew. "He barely lost blood. I think all it did was trim his fingernails for him."
Everyone but Jayne found this hilariously funny, except for Jayne, of course, who barely came out of his bunk or he was laughed at. Mal led the crew in a procession to mourn the passing of Susan, the 'best 56-tac Callister relock with automatic targeting system and extra-wide trigger with a hairpin sensor there ever was', outside Jayne's bunk door, pinning flowers to it and singing horribly off-key, the only song they all knew: 'Happy Birthday'.
"Happy deathday to 'Susan'…"
Deep in his bunk, with a pillow over his head, plus his coat, blanket and most of his clothing, Jayne gritted his teeth and waited for an embarrassing revenge.
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They stayed on Whitefall for a while, taking anything they wanted from Patience's place, feeding and refueling and relaxing. Most of the crew had forgotten about the tragedy that had occurred on Kerry. Most, but not all.
Mal knew that whatever had happened on Kerry had been bad, had been something he'd seen before- but he couldn't put his finger on it. All he could think was that the Alliance was messing around with perfectly legitimate illegal smuggling, and that wasn't quite right he could tell.
He made up his mind about Kerry late that night, when the crew was asleep in Patience's spacious rooms. He couldn't sleep, thinking about it. Who did he know who would be so evil as to blow up an innocent town of Kerrans? He knew who it was… subconsciously. He didn't actually have a name in his mind. You could say it was on the tip of his tongue.
The next morning, crew gathered around at a table eating all of Patience's vegetables and stored meat (they all were under the opinion that Patience certainly would never need it again, and they'd had nothing to eat other than tasteless protein for so long, and by that time they'd already buried their faces in her strawberry patch) and chatting. Mal waited for a break in the general conversation, and he cleared his throat.
The crew paused, looked up at him expectantly, and he began. "You know what happened on Kerry was bad. I've seen slaughter, but somethin' about this one makes me think about someone I can't quite put my finger on. I think I need to go back."
Everyone started talking at once. Mal raised his hand for silence the way he'd seen other people in power do, and to his amazement, it worked. Simon and Kaylee even stopped making sheep eyes at each other to look at him.
"I didn't say 'we', I said 'I'. If y'all want, I can drop you off somewhere, where you can wait for me if you want, and I can go to Kerry on my own."
He gave them a minute to confer.
"So," he said, once they'd conferred, "Who wants to come with me, and who am I dropping off on Canton?"
"I'm comin' with you, them ruttin' mudders!" Jayne growled. Everyone looked at him.
"I'm coming, sir."
"I will come with you as well."
"I'm not leaving River with you. I'm coming."
"Me, too!"
"I won't be much of a help, Mal, but I'll come."
"Great!" Mal looked at his crew, all joining him on this potentially dangerous mission to the ugliest planet in existence (except for Canton), and smirked evilly.
"Right, then, let's go!"
Listening to the crew protest that no, they didn't want to go right now, let's stay a little longer, the strawberries are so good, Mal smiled. This was going to be a fun trip.
Read on, it gets better! Well, you could read on if I'd uploaded the next chapter yet, but I haven't, so we have to end with an evil Mal smirk.
You there- yeah, you reading this story, I know you're there, I can see your eyes- just take that mouse, move it a little, and press that review button.
Until next chappie!