By the time Serenity gets close to Sentinel, it’s quite apparent that the Blue Sun ships have beaten off the first group of Friends and landed. They are dug in for a fight, with soldiers on the perimeter, and arrays of sensors in all directions.

Inara takes the cloaked Shuttle around to the back of Midway Terminal with Mal, Zoë, and Jayne on board, where they find a gaggle of armed Friends. Jayne steps out, and is immediately mobbed! “Hallelujah! Jayne the Liberator has returned!” In the next few moments, Jayne suffers more bruises from the backslapping than he ever suffered in any battle.

It takes a few more awkward moments of hero worship before they get down to business.

Finally the Friends say, “What guns have you brought us? None of our weapons have any effect on their big ships.”

Jayne says, I don’t have enough guns for all of you, but maybe we can find something else. Do you have any explosives?”

A Friend comes forward: “We have a big supply of explosives, but no way to deliver them. What good are they if we can’t get them close?”

Zoë says, “I have an idea…” She has a quick chat with Diana on the radio, who says her magic box can easily produce a half dozen launchers.

As Jayne and Zoë fly back for the launchers, Mal and Inara decide to scout the ships.

They land at a distant village where the Friends can drive them to Midway. Mal says, “Inara, it’s time for your special skills. I need a few moments with the soldiers looking the other way.”

As Inara distracts the soldiers as only she can, Mal takes photos and position shots of what seem to be the most vulnerable locations.

The group gathers behind the terminal again, and Mal lays out the plan; “We’ll wait until dark – the shuttle’s cloaking doesn’t work as well in atmo, but the night sky should help hide the black ship. While we’re waiting, let’s get these launchers aimed at the most vulnerable targets. Jayne and Zoë, once we’re ready, you’ll fly over their site and fire at anything that looks like it’ll make a lot of noise. When the soldiers are properly stirred up, The Friends can fire the launchers.”

The fight, when it comes, is dramatic, exciting, and over very quickly – Jayne and Zoë fly the shuttle directly over the Blue Sun location, coming out of the shadows at the last minute and firing as they zoom by. The confused soldiers turn and fire at random, and while their backs are turned, the Friends launch huge packages of explosives at the ships. By the time the soldiers regroup and prepare to charge the Friends, a second volley of explosives is on the way, one batch heading at the ammo dump which the inexperienced troops have left in the open, and the rest in the middle of the soldiers themselves.

In minutes, the entire camp is a mass of flames – only a half dozen dazed soldiers escape, to be captured immediately.

Of course, in the final story, Jayne did it all himself.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

It takes a full week of partying before Serenity can leave, now free to sail quietly to the ‘Verse. (They almost lose Diana, tho’ – when the Friends taste the fine dessert she provides to the party, she rises to being a secondary deity like Simon the Doctor, and almost the equal of Jayne the Liberator!)

While Diana feeds the Friends, Mal and Jayne decide it’s time to interrogate the prisoners. While Jayne stands on a ledge, accentuating his size and threatening looks, Mal asks the commander, “What did you people tell Blue Sun? How much do they know of what happened here?”

“We told them the whole story. They’ll be sending reinforcements here. Fat lot of good that will do us. It’s 8 light years to HQ, so it’ll be 16 years ‘til the reinforcements arrive.”

“And there’s no follow-up already en route to relieve you? That seems peculiar. Tell me now, or if reinforcements show up, your lives won’t be worth a single platinum. That’s assuming you survive my companion’s delicate treatment…” Jayne puts on his best scowl.

But threats don’t change their story. It seems to be the truth. As best Mal can discover, the Blue Sun soldiers feel that they will spend the rest of their lives here as prisoners. Jayne scowls; “I knew them gorram bastards didn’t care about us, but I didn’t think they’d ignore their own.”

But Mal’s not worried about these soldiers, it’s what he’s going to meet in the ‘Verse. He digs out the maps, and finally says to Zoë with some relief, “Blue Sun won’t be sending reinforcements here, they’ll be sending them after us. It’s 8 light years to their Headquarters, and 6 more from there to the ‘Verse. That’s 14 years, and we’ll be there in 4. We have 10 years for our revolution to succeed.”

There’s no trouble leaving this time – the Friends are feeling very good about themselves, and after a last toast to “Jayne the Liberator”, they wave goodbye to Serenity.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

As the crew prepares for the long hop back to the ‘Verse, they receive a very peculiar message from Oasis – it’s from Hans: “To my good comrades on Serenity; I have just received a message from Robert Book, and notice that you helped the Friends there defeat Blue Sun soldiers, and are on your way back to the ‘Verse. Before you go, I have some information that you might find interesting. After Allen’s shock at meeting Inara, the Eremites withdrew all the money they had invested in off planet corporations, especially Blue Sun. It was an extremely large sum, and the management of Blue Sun is very upset.”

The crew of Serenity puzzles over this, as it sounds like they’re in even more trouble than they thought. Inara tries to call Hans back to understand what she did, but gets no answer. Whatever he was trying to say, this is all they have.

The flight back is tense, with everyone reviewing and polishing their plans. There is general agreement on three basic initial objectives:

The first step is to link the Cortex to UniWiki. This will give everyone in the ‘Verse access to all the facts they should know.

Second is to tell “The Real Story of How We Have All Been Duped by Blue Sun”. This is the step that Zoë is concerned about; “When Blue Sun sees this, tian sha de e mo ping ming (those goddamn monsters will hold nothing back)”.

The third step is the one that will prevent Blue Sun or any other corporation from monopolizing trade again – they must distribute Replicators on every planet and moon. This is Mal’s biggest worry; “If we don’t get this done, we’ll have ye yan (done it all for nothing)”.

But they may need more. As they fly through the Black, they continue to look for new ways to spread the word, start the revolution. Jayne has every weapon gleaming, and Diana and Inara have created a few Broadwaves that can be downloaded to the various networks.

They’re now three weeks away from the ‘Verse, and all seems ready. The group gathers around the table to review their status. As they conclude, Diana points out the obvious; “The plans look about as complete as they can be. If it wasn’t for the minor problem that we’re outnumbered by several million to one, it would be perfect.”

Then Mal drops the Bombshell: “Yup, just about perfect. It’s so good, you don’t need me anymore. I’m resigning as Captain. I’ve thought it through very carefully, and I feel that at this point Zoë is the correct person to run the ship.”