Early version beta'd by KrisEleven. Many thanks!
Translations: Are below.
Wo de ma—Mother of God
Fei hua—Rubbish
Ta ma de—Damn it
Zhe zhen shi ge kuaile de jinzhan—This is a happy development
Qing jin—Come in
Chapter 5—Risky Business
The planet Aberdeen, February of the year 2517
"I don't hardly believe it," Kaylee whispered. "Captain, ya see?"
"Wo de ma."Jayne's voice held the appreciation of an expert.
"Husband, I don't like that look in your eyes," Zoe told Wash. "I ain't wanting to start any fights tonight, that clear?"
"You wound me." Wash placed a hand over his heart. "I am a big, strong, into-the-whole-marriage-and-commitment-thing man."
Kaylee looked up at her captain with huge eyes, knowing he could never resist that look unless there were several lives at stake. "Captain, please? It's real chocolate."
"Your cut, your game, little Kaylee. If Jayne tries to steal any, whack him with your wire cutters. We're on a job here, and I need him to stand behind me looking intimidating."
"I, ah, think I better go along," Wash said hastily. "That mousse could, you know, be poisoned. I should taste it before Kaylee. Ladies need protecting."
"You surely didn't learn that from me," Zoe said dryly. "Captain, our contact should be here soon."
"Well, it might just be me, but I feel like our looking-intimidating might be a tad compromised by a pilot and mechanic all covered in chocolate. So you two just stand over there and we'll pretend we don't know you."
"I'll take that in the spirit in which it was intended," Wash said cheerfully.
Kaylee didn't stay around to hear the rest of the conversation. She couldn't think of nothing else when that fancy chocolaty swirl thing was in the room, so she reckoned it was for everyone's good if she got a bit of it as soon as possible.
Perched on a stool, running her tongue along the rim of her spoon, Kaylee glanced brightly around the room while she waited for the nice man to serve up her bowl of mousse. There weren't no one here yet looked nearly disreputable enough to be their contact, and she hoped he or she hadn't decided to skip out on them. It'd make the captain and Zoe and Jayne no end of grumpy; the captain and Zoe 'cause they'd have to take that job from Badger and Badger worried them worse'n flies in pudding, and Jayne 'cause he wouldn't get paid near as fast.
'Sides, no job meant the captain wouldn't hear of buying that real shiny compression coil she'd spotted on the way here. Her girl Serenity had been talking to her, saying it was needed bad. 'Course, they hadn't had cash to spare for weeks, not since the repairs needed after Jayne tried out that new-fangled grenade thing he'd picked up cheap on Beaumonde. It'd driven the raiders who'd followed 'em away, but had also made a dent in the primary buffer panel as had taken two weeks to fix.
"Here you are, miss." The man managing the counter winked at her. "Enjoy. You too, sir," he added, putting down bowls in front of her and Wash.
"'Sir.'" Wash stared reflectively at the man's back as Kaylee dug in with a relish. "Interesting. Hey, would you consider having a word with my wife?" Kaylee smacked him.
"Don't ya want to sleep in your bed tonight? As opposed to elsewhere?"
"Again with the wounding. I just don't want to be mistaken for Mal again. My sense of fashion is so much better than his."
Kaylee closed her eyes blissfully at the rich taste of the mousse. Some sex she'd had ain't even come near to being as good as this. She might've come off a border world, not like no fancy Core lady, but Kaylee knew true chocolate when she tasted it. There was no mistaking it for the cheap protein cocoa mix you could pick up at any market.
Thoughts of Core ladies reminded Kaylee of her newest girlfriend. Only girlfriend, actually—Zoe was real nice, but she sure weren't hair-brushing-and-gossip material. "What do ya reckon 'Nara's doin' right now, Wash?"
"Um, let's think. What does she do for a living?"
Kaylee rolled her eyes. "She ain't havin' sex now, silly. Her client was gonna take her to that fancy dance thing. Do ya think they'll have chocolate there?"
"It's hardly a fancy party if there's no chocolate." Wash grinned. "Not that fancy parties are necessarily the best. I remember when Zoe and I..."
Kaylee let him talk while she mentally added up the credits she'd brought with here. I've got enough to get 'Nara some chocolate too, just in case. She waved the bartender down. "Can ya wrap up another bowl of this for my friend?"
"Of course. Won't be but a minute."
The door swung open, letting in a small crowd of people. Leading the way was a creamy-skinned, black-haired woman, with what Kaylee was pretty sure was that same new-fangled grenade thing strapped to her belt. Behind her was a skinny, cat-like man, eyes narrowed in the dim light of the bar, and a shorter, stocky man who seemed inclined to twitch. It was late afternoon and most hadn't gotten off from work yet, so Kaylee reckoned these had to be their contacts. Turned out she was right as the woman strode up to the captain and Zoe and Jayne. Bar was empty enough so she could hear their words, 'spite of them being across the room.
"Malcolm Reynolds?" The woman's eyes skimmed over Jayne before she held out a hand to the captain. He nodded in confirmation and shook it. "I'm Captain Vashandra Devi. This is Benson." She indicated the shorter, twitchy one. "That's Goldstein." She jerked her head at the cat-like man.
"Good to meet you. My first mate, Zoe, and Jayne." The captain gestured for the man behind the counter. He passed Kaylee her covered bowl of mousse and went to serve them drinks.
"So I'm given to understand the ship you own is a Firefly," Vashandra Devi stated. "An 03 model?"
"That'd be right."
One of Devi's men, Kaylee thought Benson, snorted a little. Devi whipped her head around to glare at him, and he shrank away. "Sorry, boss. But a Firefly? They're held together by spit and prayers!" Kaylee sat up indignantly, ready to defend her girl if he kept on with that fei hua.
Devi shook her head. "You're thinking of the 01 model. Use your brain for something besides taking up the space between your ears." She turned back to the captain. "Good for flying under the radar, those ships. Could be you'll find that useful, if we decide to do business."
"So from what I understand, you want your cargo transported to Beylix," the captain said. "Care to enlighten us on just what kind of cargo it is?"
"Salvage." Devi accepted her drink from the bartender. "Engine parts, this time around." Kaylee's eyes widened, chocolate temporarily forgotten. "Big Core companies, they never miss a shipment or two."
"No, I reckon they don't." The captain eyed Devi over his mug. "Here's the thing, though. The payment you offered us on the wave was a mite high. Not complaining, mind, but I can't help thinking maybe you want more than just getting the goods from here to there."
"You'd be correct. Usually, when we liberate a shipment, there's a little fuss on the Cortex, nothing more. But someone's kicking up their heels about this one. No one from the company, mind, people like us. I've had three crews try to break into my warehouse since it came." Devi set her drink down. "My specialty is transport, not the parts themselves. I want your mechanic to have a look at them, see if there's something special about this bunch that we've missed. Hence the higher price. Well, that, and you might run into some trouble on the road."
"Seems fair to me." The captain got to his feet. "Kaylee!" He turned back to Devi. "You want to take us there now?"
OoOoO
Kaylee trotted towards the salvage warehouse, surrounded by Zoe and Jayne and the captain. With her and 'Nara's chocolate safely in the hands of Wash, who'd gone back to Serenity, she was ready to give her full attention to them engine parts.
Benson held the door for them. Devi led the way through a sea of bundles, crates, boxes, and ceiling-high shelves, moving more quick than Kaylee'd have thought anyone could in such a mess. She and her fellow crew members picked their way among the salvage as Devi dragged three crates out from under a lopsided table. "These are the ones that seem to be causing the trouble, Miss—Kaylee, isn't it?" She set to work undoing the locks.
"Uh-huh." Kaylee knelt by the nearest unlocked crate and pried the top off, her eyes lighting up at the parts stacked inside. She picked up the nearest one and examined it. "Oooh, this is from a Capissen-45! I like the 45s. They sure fixed the brand up since they released the 38." She peered in. "Yeah, this whole box is meant for the same ship, I'm bettin.'"
"Just need to know if there's anything wrong with 'em," the captain advised.
Kaylee looked up. "Might take a while for me to go through all these."
Devi began hunting through a nearby cupboard. "Goldstein, I know you hid that moonshine from the last job in here. Seeing as you borrowed the coin to buy it from me, I know you won't mind sharing."
"Ta ma de," Goldstein muttered, not sounding too upset regardless.
The two crews divided the moonshine between them while Kaylee worked on the engines. Jayne pried open one bottle with the handle of his knife, and Benson lounged with his feet on a crate. Goldstein and Devi watched Serenity's crew over their cups like foxes with a dog in their territory, and the captain did the same between gulps. Zoe drank little, other hand resting easily near her gun.
The Capissen-45 bits just 'bout filled up the first crate, enough to keep some ship running for a long while. There was a section of a life-support system and wiring for a grav thrust in the second crate. Kaylee hummed her approval as she saw that whoever'd packed the box had wrapped the parts up with care. She had no time for anyone careless with machines.
The third crate was lighter than the others, and filled to the top with replacement drive feeds. Kaylee made sure to examine each one, knowing any could contain what they were looking for. At the bottom of the crate were broken sections of a com system. She checked those too.
"So what's the verdict, Miss Kaylee?" Devi inquired. "Anything we should know about?"
Kaylee shook her head. "There's nothin' wrong with these. All just average engine parts."
"Are you sure?"
"Sure as can be."
Zoe glanced over the crates. "Could be those crews think you've got something you don't."
"Or maybe," The captain said quietly, "there ain't nothing wrong with those parts and you know it. Maybe you spun this story to get us here."
Devi raised her eyebrows. "So I have a deadly grudge against people I've never seen before, is that it?"
"Could be someone paid ya to have us ambushed," Jayne growled.
Hands on hips, Devi glared at Jayne. "If I was going to have you ambushed, I'd come up with a better plan than—" Suddenly her gun was out, and a shot cracked the air.
Kaylee screamed, looking wildly from the captain to Zoe to Jayne, expecting to see one of 'em bleeding, but they were all still standing, and staring at the strange man who'd been sneaking up behind them, and was now writhing on the floor with Devi's bullet in his gut.
The silence lasted half a second, then all Kaylee's crew, plus Benson and Goldstein, had their guns out. Zoe pushed Kaylee under the lopsided table as a woman barreled in through the door, and two more men scrambled through the windows, all with guns firing.
Bullets flew in both directions as Kaylee stared out from under the table, unable to look away. Though the shelves made it more difficult to see, they also gave some cover. The invaders seemed to have realized too late they had two crews to deal with instead of one, and were trying to retreat. The woman and one of the men crashed out the door, the other went down with a shot to his head.
Jayne ran to the door and looked out. "No point in chasin' 'em, Mal. It's dark out there, and there's other buildin's all over they could hide in."
The captain hadn't put away his gun yet. "Weren't we talking about ambushes?"
"Yes, because I'd shoot my own man if that were the case," Devi said dryly, prodding the body with one booted foot.
"Oh, zhe zhen shi ge kuaile de jinzhan..."Goldstein was examining a graze on his shoulder. "Boss, how do we know they ain't arranged this ambush themselves?"
"Because we wouldn't have had time," Zoe told him. "We landed right before we came to meet you."
"And you were the ones that suggested we come to the warehouse tonight," Devi said patiently. "So obviously neither of us did this and it's another set of people trying to steal the goods. Well, I'm not going to keep them here any longer if I can help it." She turned to the captain. "You going to transport these goods to Beylix, or do I have to find another ship?"
Captain's sure to take it, Kaylee thought. This job might still be weak tea, but what Badger's offerin' ain't any better—and they don't trust Badger.
The captain considered for a minute, glancing from his crew to the crates to Devi. "No need to find someone else. We'll take 'em."
Devi shook hands with him. "Shiny."
In the black, February of the year 2517
"Qing jin," came Inara's voice from inside the shuttle. Kaylee entered to see her putting away the last of her calligraphy materials. She smiled warmly. "What a lovely surprise visit. I wanted to thank you for the chocolate, and I was just considering making tea. Would you like some?"
"Sure!" Kaylee flopped across one of the silk couches. "Thanks."
"Of course. I was going to invite you in regardless." Inara crossed to a carved chest of draws. "There's something I'd like to show you. A gift from a client."
"Really?" Kaylee perked up. "What?"
Inara pulled out a leather-bound book. "Samir—my client—is an antiques connoisseur. He brought me this collection of Earth-That-Was folktales. Valuable financially, of course, but I confess I'm rather more interested in the stories."
"Ooh, I've always loved fairy tales!" Kaylee took the book Inara was holding out to her and opened it to the table of contents. "It has the story of Ye Xian. My momma used to tell that to me and my sisters and brothers."
"Why don't you read it aloud while I make the tea?" Inara suggested. "I'd be happy to hear it again."
Kaylee found the right page and began reading. She told how Ye Xian's father and mother had died, leaving her all alone with her stepmother, who made her do all the most nasty work. She read how Ye Xian's only friend was a beautiful fish with big gold eyes, which she fed every day, but which her stepmother killed with a dagger. She told how a spirit had come to Ye Xian, telling her the bones of the fish had great power, and when she was in need, she should ask 'em for help. She read how, when the spring festival arrived, Ye Xian longed to go, but couldn't, 'cause she only had old, tattered clothes to wear.
"So Ye Xian went to the bones and said to 'em, please give me clothes so I can go to the festival. And all of a sudden, she was wearin' a gown that was all azure blue, and a cloak covered in the feathers of a kingfisher." Kaylee paused. "What's a kingfisher? My momma always said the cloak had peacock feathers."
"A kingfisher is another kind of bird, I think." Inara poured tea into their cups. "From Earth-That-Was, I suppose."
"And the bones gave her a pair of slippers as well," Kaylee read on. "They were woven of silver threads in a pattern like scaled fish and the soles were made of solid gold. But the bones warned her not to lose 'em."
The two of 'em drank tea as Kaylee finished reading the story—telling how Ye Xian had lost one of her shoes at the festival, which had been found by a merchant who brought it to a king. How the king had longed to find the girl the shoe fit, and tried it on lots of women, until finally he found Ye Xian. How she slipped the shoe right on her foot and he married her and they lived happily ever after.
"Would you like me to braid your hair?" Inara patted the seat in front of the mirror.
Kaylee giggled, sitting herself down. "That'd be shiny. Thanks, 'Nara."
Inara chuckled and began working at the ends of Kaylee's hair. Kaylee watched her in the mirror with a grin, admiring the graceful tilt of her wrists. She reckoned Inara could be shoveling compost in the hot sun and still manage to look elegant and cool. Almost made her jealous, but not quite, not really. 'Cause if truth was told, she wouldn't wish herself anything but what she was, and she for certain didn't want Inara to change a jot.
"So what will you do, once we arrive on Beylix?" Inara inquired. "Will you have the chance to look for the parts you needed to help with the—flare dispenser, wasn't it?"
"Yep, it's the flare dispenser. And yeah, I'm hopin' I'll get to look for them parts. We just make a few adjustments there, the system won't need to work so hard to recycle the exhaust when we break atmo. If we're not puttin' so much strain on it, we won't need to make near as many repairs after we go through a good hard burn." Kaylee paused. "Sorry, guess that must sound kinda dull to ya."
"No, not at all. Why shouldn't I be interested in how Serenity runs? I live on her and love her." Inara set down her brush and reached in a drawer for some pins. "Even if I'm not a mechanical genius like our Miss Kaylee Frye."
"Thanks." Kaylee beamed. "Can you do that fancy braid you were wearin' the other day?"
"Indeed." Inara picked up a comb and began parting Kaylee's hair. Oddly, a frown twisted her face.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing important." Inara gathered strands of Kaylee's hair and began weaving them into the braid. "I'd forgotten, though..."
"Forgotten what?" Kaylee prompted.
"That I don't really like Ye Xian's tale."
"What? Why not? I think it's sweet."
Inara sighed. "Before I left House Madrassa, I spent some time teaching apprentice Companions. So many of them saw themselves as like Ye Xian. The poor girl who becomes the beautiful princess. They don't think about the fact that their whole livelihood is going to depend on their being able to appear as the perfect consort to their clients. If they understand that at the outset, it's alright, but many don't."
"What's wrong with leavin' behind life as a poor girl?" Kaylee wanted to know. "Seemed like Ye Xian was pretty miserable afore she got married, bein' made to work all the time by her stepmother."
"The king didn't marry the poor girl, though. He married the beautiful woman in the cloak of kingfisher feathers. She'll spend the rest of her life pretending to be someone she's not."
"But she weren't wearin' her cloak when he tried the shoe on her foot," Kaylee pointed out. "Mayhap he saw somethin' in her, even when she was all dressed in tattered clothes."
Inara smiled, putting a clip at the end of Kaylee's braid. "I love how you can always find the good in everything."