Disclaimer: Joss, Fox, Universal Own ’em. (Except for Allan and the kids. they're mine) I’m just playing. No money being made.

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This story takes place nine years after Serenity (BDM) and has the established couples of Simon/Kaylee, Mal/Inara, Zoë/Allan and Jayne/River. Takes place five years post “The Bash” -

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Thanks again to Woonsocket and Chris for the Beta work

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Relics

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Chapter Eleven

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Allan ran around to the front of the wrecked ship, looking for some way to access the interior.

Approaching the bow of the inverted vessel, he noticed that the bridge's armored glass was broken. Quickly he hauled himself inside. A faint moan told him that someone had survived the crash. Allan fought his first instinct to help the injured man pinned under the remains of the helm. He had to get to the engine room.

Picking his way through the wreckage, Allan made his way aft. The going was tough with everything thrown about the interior of the vessel and the fact that it was lying upside down.

Smoke filled the air. Sparks jumped from shorted panels. Only a few of the emergency lights were functioning. Allan cursed the fact that he hadn't had time to grab a flashlight.

The hatch to the engine room was skewed from its frame. With significant effort, Allan was able to shove it open enough to enter the compartment.

Allan looked around and swore. The radiation alarm was sounding. He was being irradiated as he stood there. Orienting himself to the inverted engine room, Allan located the emergency reactor SCRAM switch and slammed his fist down the mushroom shaped button.

Nothing happened

“Fuck,” Allan swore.

Looking around the room, he spotted the yellow painted handle that would manually move the control rods into the reactor and shut it down.

Older radion core engines like the ones on Serenity and this Mayfly used a small fission reactor to energize the fusion reactor that generated power and fed the radion accelerator core drive. It was Allan's original design and was quite robust and safe.

Unless it was paired with a Caspian 38 primary drive.

Used on the Mayflies and older 01 Fireflies, along with numerous other older ship classes, the combination was lethal in a crash unless the fission reactor was shut down. The uncontrolled fission reaction would lead to a cascade failure in the fusion reactor. The Caspian drive would supercharge the fusion reaction and the result was a thermonuclear blast of about two kilotons.

Not big by weapon standards, but enough to annihilate the entire town of Redding and, of course, Serenity less than a hundred yards away.

All this flashed through Allan's mind in an instant.

The hard part was reaching the emergency lever. Normally on the floor of the engine room, it was now just out of reach on what now was the ceiling. Franticly looking about, Allan spotted an overturned toolbox; he grabbed the box only to have his hands turn red with blood. The box had crushed the skull of the Mayfly's mechanic. The man's body was draped over the engine casing.

Standing on the box, Allan could just reach the lever. He didn't have much leverage but with several pulls, he was able to seat the control rods.

The radiation alarm went silent.

Panting from the effort of moving the lever and the rush of adrenaline, Allan dropped to his knees, “Wonder how many rads I took?” he said out loud.

Allan answered his own question a moment later when he vomited his breakfast all over a junction box.

“Not... good...” Allan said just before passing out.

XXXXXXXXXX

Allan blinked his eyes open. As they focused, he didn't see the familiar ceiling of his and Zoë's bunk or even Serenity's infirmary, but a nicely appointed bedroom. The bed he lay on was quite soft and comfortable.

He felt a squeeze to his left hand and Zoë's face came into view, “Gave me a bit of a fright, Husband.”

Allan licked his lips, “Where am I?”

“Vera's house.”

“Everybody okay?”

“Everyone's fine, aside from the crew o' that Mayfly. Simon's workin’ on the survivors with the local doc.”

“I took some radiation...”

“I know. Simon gave you the anti-rad drugs soon as Mal and Jayne pulled you outta there.”

“Sorry...”

“Fer what?”

“Rushing off.”

Zoë leaned over and kissed Allan, “You saved us all. Kaylee said what would a happened if you hadn't done what you did... my hero.” Zoë kissed him again.

“Ahem,” Sylvia said from the doorway, “You up for a small visitor?”

Sara stepped around Sylvia, “Daddy?”

Allan grinned and propped himself up in bed, “Com'ere Princess.”

Sara ran to her father's side and Zoë boosted her onto the bed. “Are you okay, Daddy?”

“I'll be fine,” Allan replied before kissing his little girl on the cheek.

“That's right, you will be,” Simon said from the doorway.

“You sure, Uncle Simon?” Sara asked.

Simon smiled at the little girl, “Your father will be fine. He does need some rest, though, to give the medicine I gave him a chance to work.”

“Okay,” Sara said with a smile.

“Why don't you go find Jeff and Becca, Baby. I think Nana Vera is making cookies,” Zoë smiled.

“Cookies?”

“Yep.”

Sara hopped off the bed, then stopped and turned to her father with a stern look on her tiny face, “Do what Uncle Simon tells you to and I'll bring you a cookie later.”

“Yes, ma'am,” Allan grinned.

With a wide smile splitting her toffee colored face, Sara turned and ran from the room. With a grin, Sylvia followed the five year old.

Allan's smile faded, “Okay Simon. Give me the real news.”

“I wasn't lying. You will be fine.”

“Will?”

“You took about four times your yearly allowance of radiation. This combined with all your recent EVA time and you've had a significant exposure.”

“And...”

“The medications I gave you will stop any short term damage.”

“Long term?”

“Your cancer risk went up about fifteen percent.”

“I can live with that.”

Simon looked down at his shoes.

“Doc?” Zoë asked.

“There's a chance...” Simon paused, “a chance this... event… may have rendered you sterile.”

Allan nodded, “I see. Thank you, Simon.”

“I... I'll leave you two alone.”

Simon turned and exited the room, closing the door behind him. Zoë looked at her husband. Allan had a blank look on his face.

“Baby?”

“I'm sorry, Zoë.”

“What are you apologizing for now?”

“I know you've been thinking about...” Allan trailed off.

“We got a beautiful little girl. After Wash died, I didn't think I'd ever have a chance to be a mother. I don't care if we can't have another. We got Sara and that's more than I ever, ever hoped for.”

Allan reached up and caressed Zoë's cheek, “God, I love you.”

Zoë leaned over and kissed Allan, “Love you too.”

Downstairs, River furrowed her brow, “That's not resting.”

“What's that, River?” Sylvia asked.

“Simon told Allan to rest. He and Zoë are not.”

“You mean... you can see... that?” Sylvia asked. She was still getting used to the fact that telepathy was something that actually existed.

“Try not to watch... but they are very... loud.”

Sylvia tried to keep a straight face but lost the battle. Soon the two women were in hysterics.

XXXXXXXXXX

An hour later, Allan came down the stairs, Zoë at his side. Annie, Melissa and Vonda were sitting in Vera's parlor, drinking tea. A moment later Vera entered from the kitchen. As soon as she saw that Allan was up, she set down the tray she was carrying and stomped over to the engineer.

“And what are you doing outta bed?” Vera demanded.

Allan grinned, “Hi, Vera, nice to see you again. You're looking as lovely as ever.”

“Don't you go tryin’ to sweet talk me, young man.”

Allan wanted to reply with a snappy comeback but decided it would be better for his continued health to simply agree with Jayne's mother.

“Yes, ma'am,” he smiled.

“Now sit your pi-gu down in that chair and I'll fetch you some iced tea.”

“That sounds like a fine idea,” Allan agreed.

Allan settled into the chair and Zoë perched herself on the arm.

“How are you feeling, Allan?” Vonda asked.

“Pretty wiped out,” Allan admitted.

“What you did... I mean, wow,” Melissa said.

Allan just looked embarrassed. Zoë grinned, “That's my man.”

“How did you two meet?” Annie asked.

“Kind of how we met you,” Zoë replied. “Found Allan's ship driftin’ in space. Then he just kinda grew on me.”

“How long have you been married?” Vonda asked.

“Eighth anniversary is coming up in a few months,” Allan replied.

Vera reentered from the kitchen with a tall glass of iced tea and a sandwich.

“Thanks, Vera,” said Allan.

“From what Mattie says, you saved the whole town.”

“Well...”

“You did, Baby. Saved everyone. Soon as Simon and the Cap’n let her, Kaylee went and checked things. Says the reactor was just a couple of minutes from blowin’,” Zoë stated.

“There was a body...”

“Cap’n took care o' him before Kaylee went in.”

“What do you think happened?” Vonda asked.

“I don't know,” Allan replied. “I don't recall ever hearing about a pod disintegrating like that one did. Even if the turbine sucked something in, it wouldn't have just blown.”

Zoë nodded, “Even Serenity's pods didn't do that when we crashed.”

“Serenity crashed?” Vonda asked, wide eyed.

Zoë's face fell, “Long time ago.”

Allan squeezed her hand, “Zoë's first husband was killed in the crash. Don't worry, Serenity's been rebuilt twice since then.”

“Twice?” Annie squeaked.

Despite her heavy heart, Zoë snickered, “First time was after the crash. Second time was Allan's present to us. Put in all the nice to have things.”

“Oh,” Annie replied.

“I like Serenity. She's got character,” Melissa stated.

“Couldn't agree more,” Allan said.

XXXXXXXXXX

The next morning, after breakfast, Simon cleared Allan for light activity. The engineer wandered back to the crash site to look around. Luckily, the two houses destroyed by the crash were unoccupied at the time, but the families had lost nearly everything. The entire community had turned out to help them try to salvage what they could.

As Allan walked around the rear of the ship, he saw a middle aged man sitting on a crate. His face was swollen and bruised in spots and a pair of crutches sat next to him. The man was staring at the wreckage shaking his head. Allan walked over to him.

The injured man glared at Allan as he approached and eased his hand to the holstered pistol at his side. Allan stopped and held up his hands.

“Easy, friend. I don't mean you any harm.”

“Jus' stay where you are,” the man replied. “I done had enough people yellin’ at me for somthin’ ain't my fault.”

“You from the ship?” Allan asked.

“What of it, if I am?”

“Name's Allan. I crew on the Firefly over there.”

The man relaxed, “Jarrod Wilkins. I'm the... I was the Captain o' the Marci Mae.”

“Mind if I sit?” Allan asked the captain.

“Pull up a crate.”

Allan sat next to the younger man, “Doing okay?”

“Your ship’s doc fixed me up good.”

“Simon's good about things like that. Put me back together a time or two.”

Wilkins nodded, “Just can't figure it.”

“What's that?”

“I been flyin’ round the 'Verse near on thirty years. Flew combat for the Browncoats and in all that time, I never seen a pod blow like that, what didn't have some explosives help it along.”

“When was the last time the pods got overhauled?”

“Two months ago. Spent the coin to get her approved to haul freight for Blue Sun on contract... lot a good that does me now.”

“You mind if our mechanic and I poke around your ship a bit? Just out of curiosity. Firefly's run a similar set up.”

“Help yourself, Sheriff done poked around some, but said he needed to get his 'experts' in to look at her.

“That would be me and Kaylee,” Allan smiled, “Last name is Bryant. I'm an engineer, among other things.”

Captain Wilkins looked over at Allan, “Them other things wouldn't be runnin’ a little company, name o' Blue Sun would it.”

“It would.”

“What's rich man like you doin’ way out here?”

“This and that. One of the crew is from here. We were in the neighborhood and stopped by so he could visit his family. Matter of fact, the sheriff is his brother and our doc is his brother-in-law.”

“Would that be the big fella with the goatee that pulled me outta my ship?”

“Might be. I was a little incapacitated at the time.”

The captain's eyes went wide, “You the fella that safed the reactor?”

“I am.”

“I'm beholding to you. None o' us would be here iffin’ you didn't.”

“No offense, but I did it more out a sense of self-preservation and that of my family.”

“None taken,” Wilkins replied. He thought a moment, “Family you said?”

“Whole crew considers each other family. But my wife and daughter are here, too.”

“How old’s your girl?”

“Five.”

Wilkins looked shocked, “Ain't you a might old to be the pappy of a five year old?”

“Didn't get married till I was fifty-three. And Zoë is nineteen years younger than me.”

“Robbin’ the cradle?”

Allan chuckled, “Well if you can call it that, with her being a Browncoat herself.”

“Fought in the war, did she?”

“Yep, Serenity Valley.”

Wilkins snorted, “Gorram, qingwa cao de liumang brass. I flew Angels. We were all set to blow the purple bellies to the hot place and they pulled us out. Left ’em all there... damn.”

“She told me the stories.”

“She still have nightmares?”

Allan looked at the man, “Sometimes.”

“Me too. War changes a man.”

They sat in silence for a minute. “You got a way off here to wherever home is?” Allan asked after a bit.

“Nope. Home is that pile of go-se sitting right there,” Wilkins said, indicating the wreckage of his ship. “Lost my best friend and his wife outta the deal. My wife is still laid up in your infirmary... damn.”

Wilkins looked like he was going to lose it just then, Allan felt for the man. His whole world had come crashing down around him. Allan looked him in the eye, “We're here till your wife can be moved. Probably three or four days. I'll look at your ship and see if I can suss out what happened. Till then, take care of your wife. You need anything, you get hold of me or the Sheriff. We'll make it happen.”

Captain Wilkins looked at Allan, trying to read his face, “You're a good man, Mr. Bryant.”

“Call me Allan.”

“Then you better call me Jarrod.”

“You got it, Jerrod.”

Allan rose from his seat and after patting the younger man on the shoulder, began walking towards the wreck. He spotted Zoë leaning against the twisted hull of the Marci Mae, “You been listening?”

“Yep,” Zoë smiled. “Sylvia was right.”

“What's that?”

“Knight in shining armor.”

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TBC