Kaylee’s Lament

Chapter Fifteen

“There she goes,” Mal said, a wistful tone in his voice. “Never thought I’d see the day she left Serenity.” The she that he was speaking of was a very heavy box. It was designed to withstand all manner of ugliness in the Black and survive. Serenity’s transponder. If the engine was Serenity’s heart, and the bridge her brain, then this was as close to a soul as a ship could mechanically have. Active, it would broadcast the ship’s data to anyone who cared to look. Passive, it did little save record telemetry and do a limp broadcast of the ship’s unique transponder code, useful for proximity alarms to detect once your vessel had been scragged by Reavers, overcome with mutiny, merely exploded, or subject to the ten thousand other ailments her mortal steel was heir to. It could be shielded (and was, by smart smugglers) to avoid easy detection, but it was factory sealed against casual invasion. Wherever she went, whatever happened to her, it would be recorded here for investigators. It was record of her whole life, from the moment she came “alive” to the present moment. The radiovoltaic cell inside insured it a long, long life. And it was designed to not be removed from the ship. Ever. Ever is a long time. Between Kaylee, Tinker, and Althea, they had removed it—after two solid days of knuckle-bruising work. But it had been necessary. One of the main problems with the Plan was the not-getting-caught part. Dropping out of the sky on a lonesome piece of prairie on an untamed moon in the middle of the night to steal something was easy, and unlikely to get you caught. Flying right up to an Alliance supply depot, having the loot loaded on by unionized Alliance stevedores, and getting away without a trace, well, that was a little out of Serenity’s element. The Alliance port facility would latch on to Serenity’s transponder the moment she came within range, and regardless of what other fancy flying the ship did, the transponder code would be forever recorded in the Alliance computers, ready to be used against them in an Alliance court the very next time an Alliance official decided to stop them. Not a great way to not get caught. Kaylee’s find of another Firefly had been important. Mal hadn’t expected that – he had planned on scrounging up any old transponder that he could, hoping no one would take notice of a difference between what the signal said and what the ship actually was until it was too late. But the Pear Blossom’s transponder bought them a significant amount of time. Your transponder signal says Firefly, you look up, see a Firefly. End of investigation. Of course, showing up with two transponders would be tacky – and dangerous. So Mal had hit on the ingenious plan of removing Serenity’s transponder, letting the McKlintock’s hold it for a few weeks, then after the job was done, meet up with them later and swap back. It seemed like a good plan when he had first thought of it. In practice, like so many things, there were issues not covered by the theory. Namely, the fact that the transponders hadn’t been designed for easy removal. Or any removal, really. Kaylee hadn’t had much of a problem with the Pear Blossom’s, mostly because it was easy enough to hack out everything in her path to get to it, and she didn’t have to worry about accidentally piercing the hull and inviting explosive decompression in the frozen backwaters of Set. That was a luxury that she didn’t have here. What she did have were two fellow crackerjack mechanics and an engineering manual. It took her twice as long, but the ship didn’t blow up while she was replacing the transponder. You had to count that as a success anyway you looked at it. And that was a little troubling. This job had gone too well, so far. Despite their success – or perhaps because of it – Mal was getting worried. Nothing he’d pass on to the crew, of course. But he had the nagging suspicion that something was going to go horribly wrong. River, when she had “read” his mind (not that he really believed that she did . . . really.) she hadn’t been half wrong. He was worried about this job. He was worried about when his Bad Luck would catch up with him. He and Bad Luck, they were close and intimate friends. He had kept Bad Luck in his pocket like a hanky since those last few weeks in Serenity Valley. There had been exceptions, of course (the biggest being getting out of the valley at all, intact, with Zoe likewise). Finding the Firefly. Finding Wash. Finding Inara. Finding Kaylee. Even, if you stretched the point, finding Jayne. But for nearly every small bit of good luck, Bad Luck was always there to remind him how close they were. Wash and Zoe falling in love. Inara being so gorram alluring. Jayne just pretty much being Jayne. Only Kaylee had yet to prove where her piece of Bad Luck was coming from, and the way things were going with her lately, well, he was sure it would happen any minute. He didn’t even mind, anymore. He kind of enjoyed the thrilling adventure of it – ‘cause as bad as things on the ship got, no matter what tribulations and horrors he had to endure or witness, there was little worse in the ‘verse than what happened in that gorram valley. Everything since had been a breeze, Bad Luck in easy-to-chew, bite-sized pieces. But lately . . . well, things had been going well. Too well. And it had him powerful worried. The higher up you went, the harder you fell. If he had been a completely superstitious man, he’d blame it squarely on the Tams, or the Shepherd. While his Bad Luck still flashed every now and again, it had seemed diminished in potency since that fateful stop on Persephone. Mal was tempted towards that superstition: he was doing better than he had any right to be, especially when there were those worse off, and it wasn’t much of his doing. Here he was, a good crew – no, a great crew – who would doubtlessly move all of the Black three paces to the right if he asked them to. He had a ship that worked better now than any time since he bought it. He had coin in his pocket from the Ariel job and one or two quiet smuggling deals he’d done on the side (sure, he’d gotten tortured and nearly lost his ear, but he counted that as just occupational hazard, not Bad Luck, per se. And then there was the Lassiter, sitting in a special hidey hole only he and Zoe and Wash (and probably Kaylee, but then she knew everything about Serenity) knew about, just oozing money from every pore. Might take him a while to cash that chip in, but when he did – he could afford to buy another Firefly, if he wanted. Or make this one really, really shiny. This job, it was as complicated as you could ask for, room for mistakes every step of the way. So far, apart from a couple of good-natured brawls, it had gone exactly to plan. And that’s what worried him. Because Malcolm Reynolds wasn’t supposed to have good luck. Not this long. Not this well. The other shoe should have dropped months ago, when they were held by the Alliance; or when they were stranded in the Black; or when Niska had taken them. Or Saffron. Or, he shuddered to think, Jubal Early. That man had scared him more than any other challenge he had faced since the War. Even Niska’s casual brutality was preferable to a bounty hunter who could track them through the Black, much less get on his gorram spaceship in flight and damn near kill everyone on it. He had honestly enjoyed consigning that particular soul to the mercy of the Black, but the implications of the encounter did not escape him. If it happened once, it could happen again. There were plenty of men in the ‘verse like Early. Close calls all, but they had escaped with most of their skin each time. They had pulled it off without anyone dying, and he had ended up with cash in his purse and some thrilling stories. After years of nearly not making it, suddenly, everything was looking up. Supersticious or not, Mal had to blame that on something. Or someone. Shepherd Book? Some said it was a blessing to have a man of the cloth with you on a ship, others said it was a curse. For Mal, it was neither. Book may be a man of God – and he was a good, honorable man, no doubt about it – but that didn’t make him particularly special to Mal. And it wasn’t exactly like he was a proper Shepherd. He had proved useful, and despite his prejudice against the profession he had enjoyed having the man around. There was no way that Mal’s good fortune was brought on Serenity by a Shepherd acting in his official capacity. Mal wouldn’t even entertain the prospect. God had no more place in Malcolm Reynolds’s life, and He could just stay the hell off his gorram boat, thank you very much! If being sundered from God was Hell, then Serenity was his own personal piece of Hell, and he would stay here forever, ride her for all of eternity – because she was his own, and here he was Master, and no other man or God. No, Book wasn’t the reason. He didn’t even consider the possibility. That left the Tams. Not Simon. Oh, the boy was powerful useful, even brilliant. His skill as a surgeon and doctor had saved all their lives, and that went a long way to making up for what a poor shipmate he’d been otherwise. The dalliance with Kaylee was entertaining in some ways, distracting in others. He was even starting to develop a real criminal mind — despite himself — a talent Mal never would have suspected Simon had. No, he knew who it was. It was River. She had messed with his Bad Luck somehow. The experience in Onyx proved it. When she had looked him in the eye and told him that Inara wasn’t going to leave – and why – she had revealed herself. Because Malcolm Reynolds knew Bad Luck when he saw it, and Inara telling him that she was going to leave after the incidents at the Heart of Gold – well, that was about the worse luck that a body could have asked for. He had been content to suffer that pain in quiet dignity, knowing it for the harbinger of sorrow it was, because he saw it as Bad Luck become manifest once more in his life, suo-yo duh doh dhr-dang. But then that gorram girl and her chewed up brainpan and her empathic abilities and super-genius intelligence, she came along and burned his ass in the worst possible way: she gave him hope. Mal wasn’t the type to ignore the little things – little things kept you alive, details did. And all the bad craziness he had witnessed around River, all the bizarre, insane, inane, and profane go se that had fallen out of her mouth, she had yet to be wrong. You just had to read her right. And Mal was starting to get it. So when River said Inara wouldn’t leave because of how she felt, well, that was worse than the sting of the lash or the pangs of hunger or the burning pain of a gunshot wound – and he believed every gorram word of it. He couldn’t just say that she was shiong-muh duh duang-ren – he wouldn’t, couldn’t lie to himself that way. River might be crazy, but she had yet to be wrong. She was not likely wrong about this. So Inara wasn’t going to leave. Malcolm Reynolds was worried. His Bad Luck hadn’t held. It unsettled him. So this job had to be it. Something had to go wrong. It was complicated enough for ten thousand things to go wrong – and it only took one. That made him feel better. Those were his thoughts as he rolled the ugly box across the deck on a pallet to be hauled over to the Sky Hawk for a little vacation. The other ugly box was spot-welded into its place. For all practical purposes – soul-wise, that is – Serenity was now the Golden Pear Blossom. “I’ll take good care of it, promise,” Duncan MacKlintock said, clapping Mal on the back. “We’ll see you in two weeks, right where you said.” “Are you sure I can’t pay more? I feel like a gorram crook!” Mal said ruefully, shaking his head. “Mal,” Duncan said slowly, “you are a gorram crook, remember? But an honest one. Well, close enough. You paid us a gracious plenty for what little we done, and a pleasure it was t’do it. ‘Sides, your young physicker done examined every member o’ my crew, and that’s worth more than gold or platinum. ‘Specially when he brings such good news.” “Well, ain’t everyday you learn your gonna be a father for a tenth time.” “I know,” Duncan said, proudly. “Although Winnie’s gonna nail my ass to a bulkhead and my pecker to the deck, I come near her again. She reckoned Owen would be her last.” “That gonna be . . . a problem?” Mal asked, worried for his friend. “Y’know how some women are all happy and glowy during their time?” Duncan asked. “Heard tell of it,” Mal nodded, feeling a little relieved for his friend. “Well, Winnie, when she got a shuttle in the hanger, she’s just a pure, unadulterated hateful blanket of evil. But I’ll survive. Got me a back-up wife.” “Gee, Duncan, you make married life sound soooo appealing,” Mal said. “But congratulations.” “Y’know, I always thought there should be less people in the ‘verse,” Duncan said philosophically. “I guess I just want more of ‘em to be MacKlintocks!” “You’re well on your way, my friend. Keep flyin, Duncan,” Mal said, as the transponder rolled into the barge. “See you in a few weeks. Big fun, then. I’ll bring the wine this time. Who knows, maybe I’ll get Zoe to cook!” “You do, you best keep flyin’ past the rendezvous!” Duncan laughed. “Keep flyin’, Mal!” He closed the airlock, and it hissed as it hermetically sealed. Mal picked up an intercom and sighed before he spoke. “Wash, the door is shut, it’s time to go. Crime is money, and money is time.” “On our way, Cap,” Wash’s voice said cheerfully. That was a good sign. Mal wasn’t sure if it was the fact that Zoe had got her baby craving taken care of by playing with the MacKlintock children, or if it had been two or three days of real, home-cooked food that didn’t even remotely look like protein. But he wasn’t going to argue. A happy pilot usually meant a fast ship. “When you get the course set, join us in the kitchen,” he added. “Need to have some words.” As much fun as the unplanned shindig with the MacKlintocks had been, it was important that he refocus the gang on the job – or the “cay-pr” as Wash kept calling it. They had come far, farther than he expected they’d come by now. But there was still a very tight schedule and plenty of extra planning to do before they got to the Alliance depot. And that was just over a week away. Plenty of time for something to go wrong. He whistled a little as the ship gently lurched, a side-effect of releasing from the Sky Hawk’s airlock. He felt the gravity drive cut back on, and he continued without missing a step. Inara and Simon were already there, sitting and waiting, and Book was making a pot of tea. Coffee was already boiling – and some of the good stuff Wash had brought back from the wreck. Althea had rigged up an improvised roaster in the aft heat exchanger in return for ten glorious pounds, and they had fresh coffee now that didn’t taste like stale soy milk, and the sweet aroma was already filling the atmo. Jayne hurtled down the steps a moment behind Mal, and grabbed his usual seat. He immediately stuck his hand on his belly, just inside the waistband of his pants. “That,” he remarked appreciatively, “was ‘bout the best feed I had since . . . well, since last time we et with’em!” “You ‘et’ enough for three,” Inara said, mildly disgusted. “I’ve never seen a sight like that. And some of my clients are confirmed gluttons.” “I suppose that, failing the fulfillment of one Freudian imperative, over-indulging in the others would not be out of character,” Book said, pouring hot water into the tea pot. “My . . . my what?” asked Jayne, purely mystified. “Freudian imperatives. Back on Earth That Was, a doctor in Europe named Freud began the practice of psychiatry – that’s ‘mind doctoring’, Jayne,” Book explained. “One of his theories was that all people are driven by a few central, basic needs, the things we must have in order to live. He called them ‘imperatives’. Among them were sex and food.” “So you’re sayin’ . . .” “He’s saying that since the Sky Hawk is not a healthy place for you to find women,” Mal explained, “on account o’ Duncan and Devon bein’ willing to throw you out the nearest airlock should you come more than an arm’s length from Rowan, you ate like a dragon, instead.” “Oh,” Jayne said, understanding. “Why didn’t you just say that?” “He did,” Inara said with a frown. “He just used big words.” “Im-pare-ah-tives. That French?” he asked hopefully. “No.” “I will say that the McKlintocks are an incredibly healthy family,” Simon remarked. “A little more radiation exposure than I’d like, but I suppose that comes with the life. I was also surprised by the pregnancy.” “You weren’t the only one,” Book said, laughing. “Winnie came to me to ask just how much of a sin it was to kill the father of your unborn child.” “I think Duncan was as surprised as anyone,” Inara said, chuckling herself. “He might be a little unsophisticated, but you can’t fault his virility.” She thought for a moment. “Shepherd, while I’m thinking of it, I wanted to mention that it was, indeed, a lovely service you gave them. I think the MacKlintocks really, really appreciated it.” “Thank you, my dear,” Book said, smiling, “I was hoping I hadn’t lost my touch. Living among the heathen, it leaves your preaching abilities rather . . . flabby.” “Shepherd, you did fine,” encouraged Inara. “Didn’t see you there, young man,” he said to Simon. It was a comment, not an accusation. “I guess I’m not so particularly spiritual,” the young doctor admitted. “Not my end of things, I guess you could say. More ‘body’ than ‘soul’.” “I kinda figured as much. It did surprise me to see you there, though, Jayne,” the Shepherd commented. “Even knew all the hymns. I didn’t think you were the real church-goin’ type.” “Hey, I been to church a lot,” Jayne said defensively. “Been to near thirty-five funerals, now. Some were folks I ain’t even ended. Man in my line o’ work can’t but help respect the church, ‘cause you know you’re gonna end up in one at the end, anyhow. ‘Sides, you can sometimes pick up a new-made widder woman, you play your stones right!” “That’s as bizarre and disturbing a justification for church-goin’ as I have ever heard,” Book said, shaking his head. He knew better to ask Mal why he hadn’t attended. “Hey, how come River got t’play footsie with that boy, an’ I couldn’t even say nothin’ to Rowan?” He gave a side-long look at Inara, and capped it with a lurid wink and nod. “Redheads is kinky, y’know.” “Huh choo-shang tza-jiao duh tzang-huo,” Inara said in disgust. “First,” Mal said, ticking off his fingers, “River and Tinker are only a year apart. Second, they liked each other. Third, Rowan doesn’t particularly like you. Fourth, Duncan doesn’t particularly like you. I could go on, but I’m about to run out o’ fingers and I think I’ve clearly made my point.” “Just as well,” Jayne grumbled. “Don’t think me an’ my in-laws’d get along.” Zoe came back from the engine room, followed closely by Kaylee. They both took seats, and took tea when Book offered it to them. Wash came down only a few moments later. “Where’s River?” asked Kaylee, looking around. “I . . . I gave her a sedative,” Simon explained. “She had a bad night. The nightmares – it was the Christmas one, again, and I have no idea what brought it on.” “Just as well, her part in this is pretty minor,” Mal decided. “But now that we’re decently fed, let’s reckon on how we can pull this last bit off.” He turned to Wash. “We on course?” “Back to the charming middle of nowhere,” he said. “Don’t forget to visit the gift shop for your souvenirs on your way out!” “Let’s keep a sharp eye out for Feds. Breakin’ into a comsat once when they ain’t expectin’ it, that’s easy. Hittin’ the same one twice in a week – that’s dangerously close to predictable.” He looked at his notes. “Now, Inara? You still good on your part?” “What, you mean playing a pushy, high-maintenance Companion who’s vexed because she’s had to spend too much time on the Rim with lowlife scum? But what will my motivation be?” “I’m sure you’ll think of somthin’,” Mal said. “And Jayne, you okay on your part?” He poured himself a cup of coffee, added just a whisper of sugar. “Aw, Cap, do I gotta?” “You gotta.” “But . . . a suit? C’mon, I never wore a suit ‘cept to, um, funerals.” “Then you know how to tie the tie. Great. Kaylee, we can’t really disguise you much. More’n one eyepatch probably call too much attention—” “That is my eyepatch! No one touches the eyepatch!” Wash declared fervently. “And Zoe’s got the horrific scarification theme all sewed up, so . . . can you do filthy and non-descript?” “You just try me. I can play a . . . dirty girl. Whatever my Captain needs,” she said, putting her chin on her hands, elbows on the table. “Hey, Jayne, can I borrow your hat?” “Good girl. Shepherd, you and the Doc, you won’t have to, y’know, get too involved. When Seren—when the Pear Blossom pulls up, it’s just gonna be the four of us, Kaylee, Wash, me and Cap’n Regina over there. Just like old times. Short crew. But that shouldn’t matter none, as the Feds will actually load us up. The important thing is that we ain’t got no telltale that you other folks were ever on board. So we get the ship nice and filthy, we do a little re-arrangin’, we all act like ne’er do well scum, and we get outa there within twenty-four hours and we’re shiny.” “It’s gonna be that simple?” “As long as it don’t take more’n twenty hours or so to load all that loot, should be golden. Any more than that, well, it might get complicated. Make sure you all got your ‘Plan B it got complicated’ stuff ready, just in case.” “My plan B is to hide in a locker and weep gently for my mother,” Wash assured. “Can’t fail.” “If the rest of you have anything more productive to say than that,” added Mal, “let’s say it. Otherwise . . . let’s practice our parts.” “Mal, you chose a name yet?” Zoe asked. “Gotta fill in the IDs. Bound t’ come up at some point.” “I’ve been thinkin’ about it,” Mal said, rubbing his chin. “I always liked the name ‘Nate’.” “Short for Nathan?” asked Zoe. “Yeah, actually. But we called him Nate. Had a hand back home named Nate. Thought it sounded kind of tough. He was a pretty tough SOB.” “Not like ‘Spike’,” Wash said, ‘the sly cabaret singer.” “I think Nate sounds cute!” Kaylee offered. “Ain’t lookin’ for cute, Kaylee,” Mal warned. “It does have that Rim-world bumpkin flavor about it,” Simon offered. “Kind of ‘manure on the boots’,” Inara agreed. “Nathaniel is a proud name,” agreed Book. “From the Bible, ‘less I miss my guess.” “Ain’t lookin’ for proud anymore than cute,” Mal said, shaking his head. “Not ‘Nathanial’; Not ‘Nathan’. ‘Nate’.” “But ‘Nate’? Sir, that’s almost as . . . sissy a name as . . . ‘Nathan’.” “Nah,” Jayne said, with a laugh. “Nate just sounds like a . . . like the wimpy pretty boy you beat up to get ‘em to make up your bunk.” He considered for a moment. “You want a real, scum-o’-the-Black name? A real, don’t-care-if-you-live-or-die-so-long-as-I-don’t-gotta-bathe kinda name?” “Well, yeah,” said Mal, taken aback by their criticism. He thought ‘Nate’ had sounded pretty mean. Nate back on Shadow was the meanest hand we ever hired. “You gonna trust me on this?” Jayne asked, one eyebrow raised. “Well, yeah, I reckon I can’t think of another soul in the ‘verse who’d know a threatening name as you. ‘Jayne’ strikes fear in the heart of mortal man.” The irony escaped him. “Well, nastiest, most dishonest, most cussed piece o’ walkin’ wad o’ tah ma deh shu ma neyow scum that ever did our race the unkindness of being called a gorram human bein’,” he began. Mal could sense a long, rambling, and mostly incoherent story coming. He cut it off. “Cut to the chase, Jayne. What’s the name?” “Darryl,” Jayne said, triumphantly slapping the table with his open hand. “Darryl?” asked Mal. “Darryl!” insisted Jayne, slapping the tabletop again and grinning widely. “He was in a gang with me, once – kid’s gang, not more’n one or two misdemeanors to our name. But this kid, he was into funny-books, y’know, the kind that kids read? The kind with pitchers?” “Yeah, so?” “Well Darryl, he don’t bathe much – if at all – and if you folks think I’m crude, well, I’d be a Shepherd compared to Darryl. Always smelled like shee-niou. Used to steal them funny books the day they come out –all of them— then turn an’ sell ‘em to the other kids for ten, twenty times the price. Wouldn’t take no trade, wouldn’t bargain at all. Just plain cussed. Finally, we got tired of it, got together, whupped his ass real good, tied him to a stolen horse and sent him out into the prairie. Never saw him again,” Jayne said dreamily, as if recounting a romantic or nostalgic tale. “Darryl, you say?” Mal asked, skeptically. “Darryl. But y’got to say it with your chin real close to your chest. Like this: Darryl!” “Could work,” Zoe offered. “Name like that smells like shee-niou, to me, at least.” “See, I’m just not getting that ‘scum-bag on a plate’ vibe from that,” Wash said, shaking his head. “Not like ‘Spike’.” “Look, you wanna be a nasty niao se dub doo gway, be Darryl,” Jayne insisted. “All right, I trust you, I’ll be Darryl . . . Darryl what?” “Darryl the funny-book guy what never bathed!” Jayne insisted, aggravated. “No, you moron, what was his last name?” “Oh,” Jayne said, perplexed. “Never did find out. Just knew ‘em as ‘Darryl.’” “Darryl . . . Morgan?” suggested Kaylee. “We can make him the brother or cousin or somethin’ to that asswipe Cap’n Morgan? He can be the one he stuck w’ Regina Kuan to keep an eye on her,” Kaylee offered. “Great idea!” Simon said, writing it down. “Darryl Morgan, scourge of the spaceways.” He peered up at Mal. “You don’t mind not bathing for a week, do you Captain?” “I ‘spose I could manage,” Mal mumbled, sipping his coffee. “How would we notice?” murmured Inara. “That goes for Spike and Regina, as well,” added Simon, checking something off the list. “Hear that baby? We get to be ugly AND stinky!” “I’m such a lucky woman . . .” “And that leaves . . . what’s your scumbag space-trash name going to be, Kaylee?” Simon asked. “Rowan,” she said. There was absolute silence. “Uh, Kaylee?” asked Wash. “Uh, you sure you want to—” “I said ‘Rowan’,” she said, flatly. ‘Rowan Tchenwah.” “But that means—” “Drop it, Wash,” Kaylee said, a strange tone to her voice. “But I don’t think—” “Bi zuie, dear,” Zoe said gently but insistently. “Woman said she don’t want to talk about it. So why you still talkin’ ‘bout it?” Enough meaningful looks shot around that room to clog up the atmo filter. “O-kay,” Simon said carefully not looking up at Kaylee. “Now, remember, the idea here is to appear – and smell – offensive enough to discourage any close inspection. You need to really . . . be . . . these characters. Real frontier, Rim-world tramp freighter spacers. Or at least this Wendell’s wildest dream of them.” “I still don’t know why I ain’t workin’ this end of the job,” Jayne muttered. “Ain’t no one better at bein’ space trash as me.” “That’s the problem,” Mal said. “This here plan calls for discrete subtlety, not ass kickin’ heroics.” “I can subtly kick some ass,” defended Jayne. “You will do the parts as written,” insisted Simon. “The goal is to escape detection. This is a must, if we are going to get beyond the final hurdle: the Alliance checkpoint. If they know what’s happened by then, then it will be up to Wash’s skill to get us safely away.” “Yeah, and while I don’t mind the simple pleasure of yet another death-defying escape,” Wash said, “Let’s not pin all of our hopes on me, ‘kay? ‘Kay.” “I want you all to learn your parts flawlessly,” insisted Simon. “This isn’t like Ariel, where you just had to memorize a few technical lines. You’re going to have to improvise constantly. You need to be the character, or this isn’t going to work. Seek to avoid a close inspection, but prepared for one if it happens.” “And the Pear team, stay armed,” Book reminded them. “And not your usual weapons, or anything else that can tie you to this. They expect Rim-worlders to be a little wooly, and it will discourage idle chatter. That includes you, Kaylee,” he warned. “But I’m not a very good—” “Bi zuie,” said Mal. “That means everyone, dong ma? You wear a piece. I don’t mean for you to even touch it, but havin’ an argument at hand could keep a pleasant conversation from turnin’ ugly.” “’Sides,” Wash said, seriously, “maybe they’ll come for us in spacesuits . . .” *

*

*

They turned to and transformed Serenity. Da-bian-hua. Kaylee’s carefully painted flowers were covered up with a ratty selection of posters, calendars, notes, notices, memos, pictures, and assorted junk to the point that it would have taken a concerted search to discover a single hopeful one. Likewise her “Kaylee’s Room” sign and accompanying lights were banished to the second shuttle, along with as many personal effects as could be moved. Trash was allowed to accumulate in Serenity’s corridors – something Mal would never have stood for, but Cap’n Kuan didn’t mind much. A large hand-painted “Arachne’s Revenge – Transport & Hauling” sign appeared in the kitchen, featuring the familiar poorly-rendered spider along with an equally poorly rendered golden pear and flower. As it was painted, it looked like one was doing something obscene to the other. Similar signs were put up in the airlock, the cargo bay, and at various public spaces, along with a printed list of rules in English and Chinese:

1. Captain is GOD. 2. Don’t touch anyone else’s stuff. 3. You take your turn at dishes or die painfully. 4. You mess up a toilet, you clean up a toilet – we ain’t your gorram mother! 5. If someone dies, all personal belongings will be divided EQUALLY, with the Captain as sole arbiter. 6. Don’t leave your weapons lying around. Someone might trip. 7. If you get sick and we don’t know what it is, management reserves the right to bunk you in the airlock until we figger out what’s wrong with you. If we can’t before we land – GUESS WHAT? 8. You will respect and revere the name of Captain Morgan, storied leader of our company, at all times. AT NO TIME may the crew speak improperly of the Captain, his mother, his heritage, sexual preferences, or hygiene. Mentioning being beat up by a girl is likewise off-limits. 9. All captured salvage shall be divided EQUALLY, as per Rule 5. 10. If someone starts shooting, then you start shooting. There ain’t no “I” in Team. And like that. It was fun, in a way, allowing Serenity herself to take part in the dress up. During the week-long voyage they had a ball doing the hard work of creating her anew. With only a day to go before the pick-up date, Mal walked the ship on inspection with Simon, visibly impressed. “I gotta admit,” he said, as they came back to the kitchen. “She’s completely changed – big change. Da-bian-hua. The details.” “God is in the details,” Book said, as he came in and sat down. “I was just helpin’ Kaylee – I mean ‘Rowan’ – greaseify the walls on the engine room.” “Wait . . . God is in the details?” asked Simon. “Yeah,” answered Mal. “How’d she take it?” he asked Book. Kaylee was inordinately proud of her engine room. “’Bout what you’d think.” “Wait a minute, Mal, you said the Devil was in the details.” “Well, yeah,” answered Mal, confused. “You gotta point, or you just bein’ conversational?” “So which is it?” Simon asked pointedly. “Is God in the details, or is the Devil in the details?” “That’s a theological issue, I’m afraid,” conceded Mal. “Not my area.” “Well, which is it, Shepherd?” Book considered. “That’s a hard one. I’d say they were both in the details, and it’s the details themselves that are . . . no, that isn’t . . . wait . . . the Book of . . . in my experience . . . why do you heathens always got to be messin’ with a tired old man just ‘cause he’s got a collar and a book?” “But it’s a sincere spiritual question!” Simon insisted. “Look, outside of the life-or-death moral issues – which are usually pretty clear cut – I’d say this is the first time in my memory that the expertise of a man of God would be useful to divine the answer to such a simple question!” “You people weary me,” Book said, closing his eyes. “I still think it’s a valid question,” Simon said, sitting back with a faint look at satisfaction on his face. “Are the details inherently good, or inherently evil?” “I’d say the useful thing to say is that the details are important, irrespective of any cosmological allegiances,” Mal said, pouring a second cup of coffee. “But I’m just a layman, mind,” he added. “You’d make an old man exhaustified over that?” Book moaned. “Pretty important thing to know, I’d say,” Simon said. “Is God more of a Big Picture man, or is he a nit-picker?” “Kind of thing makes me wish for a vow of silence,” the preacher said to himself. “God or the devil,” Mal said, sipping his coffee, “in two days time we’ll be face to face with the product of our accumulated details. Let’s hope we picked the right one.” “Just plain wear me out,” muttered Book, hiding his tired face in his hands.