Guns & Violas, Part Two

--These characters and their mid-bulk transport belong to Joss Whedon, I'll scrub them and put them back after I'm done, I promise.--

~~~ "You two better be checkin' for holes in my hull!" Mal called down again. "And no more shootin', understand?! EVER!" He turned back to the teary-eyed pilot, and almost jumped in suprise. "Wash, what is it, what's goin' on...?" "Mal..., I want you to hit me." Mal eyed him warily. "Wh- Why, what'd you do..?" "No, nothing. Well..., no. It's not about that. I gotta get rid of this toothache, and with Kaylee's new jamboree and all, it's driving me bonkers! Please, Mal. If it doesn't knock out the tooth, at least it will, me..." "I ain't gonna hit ya, Wash!" Mal laughed incredulously. Wash looked the Captain up and down, stepped in and squared his shoulders as much as the pain would allow. "Alright then..!, I ate that donut you were saving!" he tempted. The Captain crossed his arms and gave him a non-punching glare. "Ya did, did'ja..? Hmm. I was savin' it so much too, ..cuz I don't like the coconut center ones.., ya did me a kindness." "Ah...!" Wash continued, backing down a bit. "Okay then, I sent out a message to the Feds on the Cortex about our.. little.. salvage op last week...?" Mal smirked. "..Right.., and ya know, I do recall they have good tooth doctors at those Fed stations, too." "Yeah, I didn't think you'd buy that..." the little man slouched back against the wall, literally tongue-in-cheek. "Talk to Simon, he'll get ya doctored up in a jiffy, so long as he's not too busy shootin' holes in my boat." He almost patted Wash on the side of the head, but opted for the shoulder instead. "Go on, get some 'a those super strength aspirins from the Doc, I'm up now thanks to the kettle drums, so I'll look after the piloting for awhile." "God, I hate even thinking about that chair..." Wash grumbled as he proceeded to the infirmary. "Hey, I had that chair specially installed for some lazy pi gu pilot ya know." Mal called after him. "Not that one, the other one that comes with complimentary drills in the mouth and a little spit sink." mumbled Wash, as he plodded along, looking ever increasingly more thoroughly wretched. "I'd take My chair any day..."

--

Kaylee finished the last note of "My Darlin' Brunhilde" and looked at the viola with affection, then bit her lip with slight irritation. She placed the instrument and bow back in it's case, and stowed it beneath her bed. Had to work on those gorram high notes, but another few weeks of practice would be all she'd need, she knew.

--

"Another few weeks 'a that'll be all I need," said the Captain as he rocked slightly in the pilot's seat. "And then I will be feelin' the need to knock out a few teeth." The Tyranosaurus on the console stared at him menacingly. "Not Kaylee, don't fret." he corrected. "Definitely Jayne, though, shootin' up my ship." Mal turned to the Brontosaurus, "Ya know, I told him, I know not how many times, ta keep his guns locked up onboard.. but does he listen to his Captain...?" "No." Mal looked at the dinosaur in suprise and disbelief, then shook himself as the voice-lender revealed herself. "Has to keep them locked up on account of me." River padded up almost silently beside him. He regarded the stealthy space ninja (spinja) for a moment before speaking. "Well, for everybody's sake. I'm just sayin', it's policy is all, on my ship. Safety. Don't go turnin' this all about." "You're mad at Jayne." River observed. "When am I ain't?" "You do this often." "Hmm? What? Be mad at Jayne..? Seems ta end up that way, most times." Mal sighed. "No, talk to Wash's dinosaurs." she pointed quickly at the plastic thunder lizards. Mal nervously scratched at his cheek. "Oh.., that. Well, I was mostly talkin' at them. Venting, you know. I wasn't playin' with 'em, or anything like Wash does." The girl cocked her head slightly, sorting the emanations. "Not since I got here." An odd silence choked the air upon the bridge for a span. "...Let's just keep that 'tween you an' me, shiny..?" Mal disguised a difficult swallow, then tried to explain. "It's that.., well it gets aw'fly boring out in the Black sometimes, it's just... they're.., well Wash started it!" "A secret for a secret." River offered. Mal thought briefly, then gave a lop-sided smile, "Sounds ta be a fair trade. What's your secret?, and I won't tell a soul." "I dropped dinner in the dishwater last night." River squeaked with furrowed brow. Smile still withholding, he continued, "You mean, as in..." "When I was seperating the combined soy and pasta product from the liquid emulsive agent." she plainly explained. "Gravity grabbed it." "...and so, we had a different packet of noodles, right?" Mal swallowed visably this time. "No." "You mean we...?" Mal's eyes became distant. "Yes. Already cooked, it seemed redundant to procure more." A hint of green shown on his blue-cast face. "So.., that wasn't just...?" "Flavoring?" gathered River. "Yeah.. herbs and such.." "Nope." "Oh, I did not need to hear your secret, River." Mal choked back what was tasting like old refried lard, protein paste crust, and a hint of Blue Sun dish soap with Lime. "I thinks-lahhhehhh- I'm gonna go join Wash fer a minute... If any big planets show up outside the windows, just steer 'round 'em, dohn-ma? And no donuts." Thoughts of the coconut center donut flashed quickly, causing his stomach to turn on him. "Back in a bit."

--

Mal tried not to glare at the mechanic as he passed by. Eyes forward, stomach contents restrained, no donuts. Kaylee bounded up her ladder and onto the grillwork of the hallway, giving a quick "Hey, Cap'n!" as Mal stalked past. Getting no response, she shrugged and turned towards the bridge. It was time to refit that clogged hydraulic stabilizer filter, and she could have sworn there was a new one somewhere amidst the jumble of spare part crates at the lower front of the bridge. That gorram thing was probably the reason for all the shudderin' and boomin' lately, bein' all clogged up as it were. The Captain's brand of cheerfulness wasn't going to get her down, he'd get back to his old self soon enough.. Maybe he needed a little melody to soothe his frayed nerves? Kaylee hummed to herself as she took to the stairwell and on to her duties. "Hey Wash," Kaylee began. "Do we still have..?" River was busy refining a calculated course trajectory adjustment on the left screen at the station. She glanced quickly at the approaching mechanic through a hair curtain, still typing in coordinates for a slingshot path around a dead Paquin moon. "Wash wears shorter hair." she stated. "Oh, Hi River." Kaylee beamed, slightly confused, but still cheerful. "I didn't expect you to be up here." She watched with a slight tingling of apprehension as River continued methodically plotting. "Are ya sure it's alright ta be.., you know..." "And no dress." "Shuh muh...?" Kaylee asked. "Even his wife doesn't." River continued as an afterthought. Kaylee moved to the ladder, casting a cautious and suspicious glance at the girl's handiwork. River didn't seem to notice, intent upon proper decimal point placement for duration of burn after attaining a partial geosynchronous orbit. She did a quick count on her fingers and input the attained result. "Okay...," Kaylee sighed, returning to her own task, but making a mental note to get Wash, or the Captain the hell back up here as soon as possible. She scanned the front windows quickly before starting down the ladder, confident that they were in no imminent peril, being in the middle of nowhere with nothing to crash into..., at the moment anyway. "Watch out for dinosaurs." River warned. Kaylee looked up and almost had a chance to question the meaning of this, but as her foot came off the bottom rung it crunched down on something, twisting her ankle something fierce. She cried out and found herself suddenly on the floor, staring at an upside-down stegosaurus's butt.

--

Wash tossed in two and took a long draught of water. "Wha--? Hey! Doctor's orders...?" Simon said, a bit too late. "I said one. One." Wash finished his glass of water and placed it on the infirmary counter. "Thanks Doc, but this is some serious powerful pain, lemme tell ya. Don't think one'd have done it, especially with the viola factor." Simon smiled slightly, "Kaylee has been practicing quite a bit lately..." "Sad ta say." Wash acknowledged. "I can't hold it against her though, I just wish the two hadn't coincided." "Yes, a toothache can be a terrible thing." Simon agreed. "No, I meant Kaylee and the damn violin. What would three do to me...?" Wash asked as he eyed the label on the vial. Simon folded his arms and leaned back against the counter. "Hmm, three... Probably intestinal bleeding, possible brain hemhorage, and acute loss of awareness." Wash squinted as he continued examining the bottle, scratching at a small smudge on the Chinese with his thumbnail. "So, not so much worse than now..."

--

The Captain took the steps down to the lounge two at a time as his stomach bucked and churned. "I knew I shoulda hired a real cook..." He breathed, making a bee-line for what he hoped was an unoccupied bathroom. "Back on Beaumonde.., knew I shoulda taken that offer... Wai, if there's anybody in there, I'm fixin' ta either shoot ya, or show ya my lunch. Mayhap both! Not sure the order!" Mal banged on the door quickly before ripping it open. "And don't operate any heavy machinery for at least eight hours." came Simon's voice from the infirmary. Mal whipped a contemplative look in the voice's direction, realized the time factor as his stomach nervously twitched, and decided on the correct course of action. "Does that include a transport ship...?" Wash questioned a bit blearily. "They're supposedly weightless in space, ya know. Not too incredibly heavy." Teary-eyed, the Captain stared into the business-end of the stainless steel toilet bowl, as the conversation from outside drifted to him as a dull drum in the enclosed privy. Any moment now. Any moment... "Well, I suppose that's alright..." Simon reasoned, as he left the infirmary and returned to the task appointed him by Jayne. "But no wild stuff, like loop-dee-loops, or donuts."

--

Serenity lurched quite suddenly. Caught in the gravitational pull of the pock-marked moon, her course shifted a might too abruptly for the grav drive to adequately compensate. Kaylee watched the stegosaurus lift from the floor and hover, moments before she too became weightless. The pain in her ankle subsided enough in this temporary zero-g to allow her to get to and scale the ladder. Above, River was anchored to the steering wheel, bare feet flapping behind her, as though swimming. Wash proceeded up the rear stairway, feeling the increasing bliss of pain relief as his legs got lighter, ..and lighter, and soon they were drifting up the stairwell in front of him as he desperately clung to the handrail. Mal began to wonder why the bathroom had turned over on him, but as the toilet water began coalescing into spheres, he quickly reasoned it out. He became very thankful as well that he hadn't in fact puked. As Simon finished cleaning Esmerelda's last chamber, he felt a bit more competent with the weapon. It felt so light in his hand now. Lighter than air, in fact. He released the revolver and watched quizically as it floated above the lounge table, then turning, he caught a fleeting glimpse of Wash's inverted head disappearing up the stairway, his Hawaiin shirt trailing out like a cape. Jayne tore open the unshot packet of Blue Sun stir-and-serve oatmeal with a wicked gleam in his eye. The contents promply emptied themselves upwards as his boots left the kitchen floor. "Gorram it!" he bellowed. "Grav drive's on the fritz again?! I was fixin' ta have me some chow, too!" The merc pulled himself along to the rear bulkhead, then drove his full weight forward to reach the engine room.

-- In the cargo bay, 165 barrels of Grade A Beaumonde's Best began a chaotic and utterly shitty parade.

-- "I don't think this is the pills talkin'..." Wash muttered as he drifted backwards into the rear hallway. Jayne sped onwards, fists before him like some kind of crazed super space hero. His eyes widened as a pilot appeared in his path. Wash mimicked the eye thing, as the train bearing down on him would not, for the life of him, derail. "...but I hope that's the pills!" He cried, scrambling uselessly. "Little Man...!" The fists connected solidly with the side of Wash's jaw, sending the pilot spinning wildly through the engine room doorway. Jayne slowed up, braced himself against the bulkhead and peered in. "Wash? Gorram it, I couldn't stop. You okay..?" Wash hovered near the right side of the engine, slowly rubbing his jaw. "You mean, other than being decked by Superman..? Yeah, I'm shiny." He reached in and popped out a single tooth that was floating in his mouth. "Hey, luckily I didn't swallow it." smiled Wash. "Thanks Jayne." "Uh, sure." Jayne eyed him, confused. "Glad I could help." A hint of pain made Wash do a quick double check. After finding its source, he looked back at Jayne with a sigh, "Never mind. Wrong one. Ho Tze Gun..."

(to be concluded...)