It really had been easy.
Centauri Five was a habitable asteroid, but it needed to have its living space domed in order to regulate the amounts of nitrogen and oxygen in the air. As it stood, the place had too rich a nitrogen mixture.
Every main entrance in to Gabriel Tam's torture lair was equipped with an airlock, and each was manned by a two-man team. Unbeknownst to the crew, he'd heard the stories about what had happened at Niska's skyplex, and decided to take no chances with intruders of his own.
Unfortunately, he didn't realize which crew had perfected the "airlock snap" in the first place.
River had sat at the controls, mentally running through the checklist: power down, jam all signals going to and from the target, and fly straight.
Mal, Zoe and Jayne stood in the kitchen, picking and choosing their weapons carefully. Vera was definitely coming on this trip, as was no less than twelve of her sisters and a handful of their grenade cousins. Zoe packed extra ammunition for her shotgun and brought out a few relics left from the Niska job. "Too good to throw away," she'd said when Mal questioned their usefulness. He himself was loading up on spare bullets for his own piece and borrowing a few of Jayne's "girls." When they finished, the three looked like a walking armory.
Even River was carrying on this trip—against his better judgement, Jayne had grudgingly allowed the girl to choose two of his better pieces. She settled on a standard pistol he called "Lois" and a Mataber-design he called "Cindy." She also had her favorite knife—the one from the knife block on the counter. "'Least we know she knows how to use it," commented Jayne as River tucked the blade into the sheath she'd made for it.
Simon and Inara were busy as well, packing as much medicine and supplies they could fit into Simon's red bag. The captain insisted that everyone went armed on this trip, and so the young doctor found himself carrying a six-shot revolver and the Companion was carrying her surprisingly useful crossbow, as well as a compliment of extra arrows.
"The captain does realize I'm a lousy shot, right?" Simon asked flatly as he added several rolls of bandage to his already overstuffed bag.
"I think the idea is to give him a little piece of mind," replied Inara.
Within minutes, iSerenity/i was in range of the facility's front door. River began the "snap" sequence, and joined the others down in the cargo bay.
It had been very easy, indeed.
Gabriel stood looking at the com unit in his hand, mildly shocked but not terribly surprised. Though he'd never thought he'd lay eyes on the boy again, he'd forgotten just how determined the little piece of go-se could be.
"Well, hello Simon," he said evenly into the com unit.
"Where is she?" came his son's voice, positively dripping with venom.
"Temper," Gabriel chided. He really didn't worry too much about actually being found-after all, the entire facility was built as a maze to thwart just such an intrusion. He really had done his homework this time. "I honestly have no idea what you're talking about," he lied, trying to keep Simon on the other end of the link.
Silence. The com lay still in the elder Tam's hand.
I suppose now he's going to try and find the girl on his own, he thought to himself. He decided to try another tactic. "I'm sure you're well aware that this place is built to withstand such…intrusions as these," he stated simply. "The girl is of no consequence to me—you can have her back, for all I care." He paused. "That is, of course, after I lay claim to her child."
Silence again. Then a crackle: "You honestly think I would let you come near my child?"
Gabriel chuckled. "From where I stand, boy, it doesn't look like you have much choice. The child for the girl, plain and simple."
Another pause. "Go to hell." Then an ear-splitting squelch, then dead silence.
Oh, well, thought Gabriel. Now we have to do this the hard way.
"Well, hell, doc, I coulda told you that was gonna happen," said Jayne.
Simon's determination never wavered. He looked down the three halls that connected at the entrance area. "We split up," he said.
"And what if crazy man comes charging for us?"
"You shoot him, Jayne," said Zoe evenly.
"But don't kill him," added Mal. "I want some 'personal time' with this tamade hundan my own self. That is, if the doc and the little albatross don't mind," he added hastily.
Both siblings looked at their captain with a do-you-think-we-rutting-care? look on their faces. They paired off, each set of two taking a similar-looking dark marble hallway.
"All of these doors look the same," Inara pointed out. She and River had taken the left hallway, and it seemed to contain dozens of halls full of swinging double doors.
"Torture rooms," said River.
The Companion peered into one of the rooms. Like everything else in this place, it was lined in black marble, but she could make out a strange looking exam table equipped with full restraints. "What on earth is going on here?" she wondered aloud.
"Testing," replied the girl, who looked like she was trying to focus. Inara knew she was trying to use her Reading ability to find her beloved sister-in-law. "She screamed. He hurt her, over and over and over…" She closed her eyes, trying to block out the memory of what had happened behind those doors.
Then she opened her eyes. "This way," she said, pulling Inara by the sleeve down another branch of corridor.
Jayne and Zoe said nothing as they searched the middle corridor. They had worked together long enough to know how the other reacted, how each would handle a certain situation.
Jayne kept looking for any sign of life that could be "interrogated" as he followed the stream of smooth black doors.
Zoe kept her eyes open for any sign of Kaylee or Simon's sadistic father. It baffled her to no end how some people could take to being so completely evil. She'd seen horrible things in the war, that was true—but someone who seemed to enjoy causing pain to others, that was something else entirely. Come to think about it, the hundan wasn't all that different from Niska, and they knew how that little situation had turned out.
Suddenly, there was a flash of white, darting across into an adjacent corridor. The two shooters made a beeline straight for it.
"Ow!" the white coat cried.
Jayne made sure the man got a good look at Vera before Zoe spoke. "You're gonna help us find someone," she said evenly, "or I let him use that on you."
The man's eyes widened as he took in the size of Jayne's very favorite gun. "Who're you looking for?" he said meekly.
"Man named Gabriel Tam. Runs the place, so's I hear. Know where he is?" Zoe glanced over at Jayne, who gave Vera a shake.
"Make two lefts and then just go straight-end of the hall," the man squeaked. He hadn't signed up to be shot by mercenaries, not him.
The two left the man quaking in his boots as they turned right down the next hallway.
Mal felt a shiver going up his spine. "Gorram cold in here," he said, keeping his eyes peeled for the man he so wanted to have a "chat" with.
"This was done on purpose," Simon replied. "I've heard of tests being done to see if temperature could be used as a form of painless coercion…"
"Studying up on the finer ways of torture in those books of yours, doc?" Mal chided.
"Hardly." Simon paced, knowing that in order to find where his wife was being kept he'd have to look for an unordinary door. His father would take no chances with Kaylee, and he'd make sure she couldn't escape whatever he put her in.
The two men passed what seemed to be the twelfth set of double doors, with no luck. Every door seemed ordinary. Simon peered into one of the rooms, and found a chair much like the "dream chair" that he's seen River subjected to at the Academy. He wondered if Kaylee had been forced into one of those horrible devices. Simon shuddered at the thought.
"Wait—what's that up ahead?" he asked, seeing a pair of white shapes standing next to a flat wall.
"Let's go find out," said the captain, placing his hand on his trusted weapon.
"In here." River had led her to a sinister looking set of doors at the end of the hallway. These were old-fashioned, like those Inara often associated with saloon doors, except that these covered every inch of the door's threshold.
The two women stepped inside to find a darkened space, illuminated by only a single light panel. Inara noticed the strange shapes that seemed to be hanging from the ceiling.
"Those are chains," she said, her mind reeling. Her feet connected with a second pair on the ground. "Why would anyone…"
"Likes to make them scream. Wants them to learn. They don't." River picked her way towards a steel table and placed her hand on something Inara couldn't quite make out.
"She didn't learn. Poor thing. Just tried to be nice."
Inara's heart skipped a beat. "River, that isn't…"
"No." The girl was forceful on that point. "She knew her, though. Suffered for it."
"We have to find Kaylee," Inara said flatly, and both she and River wasted no time getting out of that cold death chamber.
There had only been a few times when Simon wished he had it in him to kill someone. He remembered wanting to shoot that federal—Dobson—after the man tried to take River back to that hellhole. He remembered his experience in the skyplex. He remembered the fateful day on Miranda when River had performed her "Reaver dance" and had managed to do what the rest of them could not.
All those paled in comparison to what he felt now.
After dispatching the guards in a short but decisive gunfight, Simon realized that the "wall" wasn't "flat" at all, but had a holo-door installed. After unsuccessfully trying to open it using normal methods, Mal had simply decided to shoot the thing into submission. Simon had protested, warning that such a move might seal Kaylee in permanently, but for once luck was on their side—the "wall" shorted and revealed a narrow opening, just enough for the two to enter single-file.
It was then that Simon grasped the extent of his father's depravity.
There, lying on a large four-poster, was Kaylee. She was lying on her side, her teeth chattering violently against the freezing temperature the room was kept at. Even Simon was beginning to feel his own teeth quake, and he had on a pullover and warm slacks. Kaylee had nothing on at all.
Simon cursed under his breath, while Mal voiced his own stream of Chinese. Both men rushed over to her, and Simon took off his pullover, planning to put it on Kaylee. He visually checked his wife's extended abdomen—the baby was still inside her, and appeared to be unharmed. He pulled out a stethoscope from his bag and began listening for the heartbeat.
In her sleep, Kaylee began to push Simon's hand away. "No, no," she mumbled. "'S so cold—don't touch me…"
"It's okay, bao bei," Simon said into her ear. "It's okay. We've got you." He placed his hand on her shoulder, and Kaylee winced, crying out in pain.
"Tamade, said Mal, his voice nearly a whisper. "You need to see this, doc," he said, his tone leaving no room for argument.
Simon walked around the bed to where the seething captain was standing. There he saw what had made him so angry. Kaylee's back, shoulders, legs-everything on the backside of her body was covered in violent bruises. The young man didn't know whether to rage or cry.
"Come on, Kaylee," he said tersely. "Wake up, sweetie. We're going to take you home now." To Mal he said, "Help me with her. She's going to have to walk—the soles of her feet are the only things that weren't injured."
Mal took Kaylee's right side, while Simon took her left. Gingerly, the two helped the girl to her feet and they began slowly walking her to the door. There was no resistance as they crossed the threshold with their mechanic—the field that controlled the bands around her wrists had been destroyed when the room's control panel had been shot out.
"It seem strange to you that there's no one trying to stop us?" asked Simon as they inched their way through the hall.
"It surely does," said Mal, even more tense that when he'd come through the first time. "Makes me wonder what else your old man has in store for us."
Why must it always be difficult? Gabriel thought to himself as he made his way back to his private office.
His plans—his carefully laid and methodically perfect plans—were now in ruins. He hadn't counted on the girl's crewmates being able to find his little piece of space so quickly, nor did he imagine they would have been so adept at getting inside.
This certainly explains a few things, he mused as he rounded a corner into a carefully hidden hallway. Like the stories about my ungrateful children's exploits turning into legends. He would never admit it, but he was just a little jealous of his offspring's popular notoriety. Those stories—those legends-should have been about himself and his contributions to the "betterment of society."
He pressed a button on the little remote, only to find the control panel in shambles. Wires were pulled pell-mell, sparks shot out of the frayed ends in short bursts, and the door to his inner sanctum was left widely and precariously open.
Gabriel stepped inside, almost daring whoever had broken in to find him. No one-no one-ever dared to insult him with impunity. His wife, the kitchen girl, countless others-all of them had paid dearly for their offense.
However, a willful spirit and borderline psychotic personality is no match for a Callahan full-bore auto lock with customized trigger double-cartridge thorough-gage. Gabriel stared at the weapon, its end pointing dangerously close to his chest.
"Bout time you showed up," growled the gun's owner, a man that at once amazed and reviled the old doctor. "Question is, what do we do with him now?" The man turned towards his partner-in-crime, an elegant-looking black woman holding her own equally nasty collection of weapons.
The woman's face held no expression. "See what the captain thinks," she said. "Recall he wanted to have words with him."
The man's face fell. "Should just shoot him, on principle and all," he complained lamely. It was obvious the man would take great pleasure in inflicting immense pain onto the old doctor, and sleep well an hour afterward.
Gabriel opened his mouth to speak, but was quickly silenced. "Done enough bossing, so's I figure—time to take some orders of your own," said the man, who quickly took Gabriel's feet from underneath him in one easy motion, effectively pinning him to the cold floor. The Callahan was still pointed precariously at him, and he noticed the man's finger just itching to pull the trigger.
The woman leaned over, making certain her face was the only thing he saw. "Where is Kaylee?" she asked in a flat and vile-filled tone.
Simon could tell that each step Kaylee took was torture. He hated to put his wife through more pain, but there simply was no way they could carry her. Even after she'd been shot, during his first day on Serenity, it had taken both himself and Mal to lift her. Coupled with the added weight of her pregnancy and the baby, it made a one-person lift impossible.
There was also the matter of her injuries. Her back was so swollen and tender that he couldn't even put his pullover on her without making her cry out. Simon hoped to find Inara, and soon—she had on a full-length robe that could easily be wrapped around Kaylee's battered form without causing her pain.
Suddenly he could make out the sound of footsteps, faint at first, but then growing louder. "Someone's coming," he hissed at the captain.
The three stood in place for a few minutes, Simon trying to hold Kaylee upright while Mal reached for his pistol. For her part, Kaylee was still barely conscious, and was protesting softly. Simon realized that she still believed his father's men were taking her somewhere, and that she didn't realize that the "men" walking her slowly down the hall were in fact her beloved husband and the captain she trusted completely.
"Is that…is she…merciful Buddha…" The words came out in short bursts, Inara's voice mixed with joy at finding her mei-mei and with repulsion and anger at what had been done to her. River stood silently, her eyes still searching for any sign of a threat.
Give me your robe," Simon said, and Inara handed the garment over at once. He gently pulled Kaylee's arms through it, causing her to whimper slightly, and then tied the sash around the middle. Inara suddenly shivered in her thin underclothes—she hadn't really noticed the frigid temperature until just now. "Why on earth is it so cold in here?" she asked.
"Some form of painless torture is my guess," replied the young doctor. "It's chilly everywhere, but in the room we found her in…"
"Damn near an ice machine, 'Nara," chimed in Mal. "And she didn't have a stitch on her." His face contorted with silent fury. "I find this bastard, I aim to have me a good long chat with him. Maybe with bullets."
"I likely won't join in the shooting, but I certainly won't stop you, captain," said Simon. For the first time in his life, he seriously was considering condoning torture on a living being.
"He'd deserve it," Inara said, taking up Kaylee's right side to allow Mal and River to walk behind and in front of the party, their weapons at the ready. "River found a room where the hundan literally whipped someone to death. At first I thought it was Kaylee…"
"Wasn't," said River. No one turned, but she knew she had everyone's attention. "Was another girl—young, needed a job. She found out what he was doing, tried to help Kaylee. Didn't work."
"Then she must have been the first course," replied the captain. "Little Kaylee's got her own set of hurt, all up and down her backside."
Inara, in disbelief, pulled up the back of the robe Kaylee wore. A stream of Chinese followed as she witnessed what the young mechanic had endured. "And the baby?" she asked, looking over at Simon.
"As far as I can tell, the baby is fine," he said. "I'll have to run a few tests before I'm sure, but…"
"Starting," interjected River.
"What's starting, River?" asked Inara.
Just then there was a dull splat sound, and Kaylee's face contorted in sheer agony.
Everyone looked at everyone else. "We need to get back to the ship," said Simon in a no-nonsense tone of voice.
The party tried to double-time it, taking into account the state of their injured mechanic and the inevitable arrival of her unborn child. They had made it to the front entrance when suddenly Kaylee stopped moving. No matter how they tried to push her across the threshold, her arms simply would not let her pass.
It was then that Mal noticed the silver bands around Kaylee's wrists. He also saw the faint scars of scratches around each tightly clasped. Jen dao mei, he breathed. "These are that new form of slave control," he said. "Uses magnetic fields to keep certain folks in certain places—cuts down on the escapes."
Both he and Simon, and then River and Inara, tried to prize the bands off of Kaylee's wrists, but to no avail. "There has to be a control that releases them," said Inara simply. "I mean, they have to go on somehow…"
"They do," came a voice, coughing. Everyone turned to see the face of Kaylee's tormentor, contorted in shame and frustration.
"How do they come off?" demanded Simon. There was no time for his father to play his mind games—he had a baby to deliver.
"Give me the child, and I tell you."
Mal walked over to the man and shot him in the thigh. His own face was contorted in pure rage. "You tell us how they come off, or I shoot you until you do. Takes a long time for a man to die if you don't hit anything important."
Gabriel smiled, a wicked, evil grin washing over his face. "Go ahead. Shoot me. The child will still be mine, and the girl will likely die. I suppose you've seen her condition?" he remarked, a taunt in his voice.
"What condition?" Jayne and Zoe asked in unison.
"Yeah, I saw. Hear tell you murder girls who try to help too. Makes me wonder if'n you are truly psychotic, or you just have a thing against women." To Jayne and Zoe he replied, "Hundan beat Kaylee more'n black-and-blue. She can't even lay on her back or be carried without hurting her."
Just then Kaylee cried out, a wave of pain passing over her.
"It's coming," cried Gabriel with glee.
There was another shot, and Gabriel felt white-hot pain passing through his other thigh. "The bands?"
"The child," Gabriel insisted.
Another shot, this time through the arm. He still refused.
Two more shots, through both feet. Gabriel, no longer being able to stand, fell unceremoniously to the floor. Still nothing.
Finally Zoe began searching the man's pockets. Her hands brushed against the small remote he kept on his person at all times. "Sir," she said, tossing he device to Mal.
The captain walked over to Kaylee and began pressing the buttons. The third time was the charm—as soon as the button was pressed, the bands fell off of her wrists, clattering to the floor.
It was then that Kaylee realized who was standing next to her. "Simon?" she asked, her voice holding a note of disbelief. Her head turned as she took in the sight of the faces she knew—worried Inara, stoic Zoe, Jayne, little River—and finally her eyes met with the two most important men in her life. "'m not dreamin'?" she asked, her words coming out in a slurred mumble.
"No, bao bei, you're not," said Simon, his voice filled with joy and relief. "But we have to get you on the ship now, and into the infirmary."
"Okay," she said weakly. "Hurts to walk, though…"
"It's gonna hurt for a little while, little Kaylee," said Mal. "Doc's gonna fix you right up just as soon as that little'n comes."
"Am I…" Kaylee began, until another wave washed over her. She cried out in pure agony.
"Everybody on the ship, now!" cried Simon.
Mal and Jayne each took one of Gabriel's injured arms, dragging the man across the floor and into the airlock of Serenity. "That means everyone, seeing as I plan to have some words with you before long."