Hitchhikers Guide to Eureka: Part 3
Nathan Stark sat in his office, going through the meticulous transcripts of the interviews taken with each of their visitors.
Mal - the Captain. A hard man who obviously just wanted to get back a quickly as possible, if they could work out how. And he was itching to get his weapons back.
Zoe - his second in command, obviously eager to get her hands back on her weapons before she would feel safe too.
Jayne - ships mercenary, he’d already fought with Deputy Lupo. So they needed to keep a close eye on him, especially if they let them have their weapons back.
But giving them back their firearms seemed the easiest way to help them to feel at home here, at least until they worked out hoe to get them back to their own time and place.
Wash - Zoe’s husband and pilot, from whom they could find a lot out about the future of space travel; and Kaylee - the ships mechanic, from whom they also could find out a lot about future space travel & how their engines work.
Simon - ship’s doctor, from whom they could find out about the advances in medicine and surgery; and River - the doctor’s mentally disturbed teenaged sister. She had obviously undergone extensive and unnecessary brain surgery. And she seemed to know about things she couldn’t possibly. If he could keep Simon’s attentions elsewhere, Stark wanted to explore and study her abilities further.
Book - a preacher on board ship, but with an extensive knowledge of weapons, interrogation techniques and the inner workings of what they called the Alliance. He was not what he seemed to be to his crewmates.
And lastly Inara - what they called a Companion, who seemed to be some kind of Geisha; a revered profession much like Geishas in Japan even in modern times. He wanted to get to know her a whole lot better; she was beautiful and so refined. But he’d better watch his step. The Captain bristled every time he and Inara exchanged even the simplest pleasantries.
Stark mused over how they would get all the information they could out of their strange visitors, without them even realizing.
First thing was to get the Sheriff to return their weapons. Then to allow them free reign throughout the town. Hopefully that would lead Mal, Zoe and Jayne with the Sheriff and Deputy, where they could have a careful eye kept on them.
Kaylee and Wash would gravitate to Henry’s garage. Simon and River could be prized apart by Alison and Beverley. Alison already had a rapport with River and she could bring her to talk with him. Beverley could get anyone to talk, and she was sure that Simon would be interested in psychiatry, particularly when he considered River’s abilities and psychoses.
That only left Book and Inara, and he was sure that between Beverley in her guesthouse, and Vincent at Café Diem, they could keep them occupied. Besides which, Stark himself wanted a little time alone with each of them. With Book to discover more about this Alliance, and with Inara, just to spend time alone with this gorgeous woman, well that wasn’t such a crime, was it?
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The news that strangers from the future had just appeared in Eureka was spreading through the town like wildfire; and nowhere was gossip spread quite like at Café Diem.
Vincent had had a steady stream of customers all day. Something he never usually complained about, but today each asked him in their own way about exactly who and what had arrived in Eureka. He was as uninformed about the mysterious visitors as anyone else, but it was about to be Henry Deacon’s weekly Town Meeting, so Café Diem was abuzz.
As the chimes sounded, each customer got out their VidCell’s and were all glued to Henry’s one minute broadcast.
“Good morning, Eureka! And here’s the Monday Morning Minute. The one thing everyone’s talking about: exactly who or what has arrived in Eureka? I got the low down straight from the horse’s mouth: Dr Nathan Stark, head of Global Dynamics. [Nathan speaks: We have nine visitors who have arrived for a… prolonged visit in our little town. My team at Global Dynamics are working around the clock to find out exactly what has… drawn them here. When we find that out we can help them return home.] Thank you Dr Stark for your succinct and… carefully worded statement.
So, why they’ve come, we still don’t know; and who they are, well it looks like they’re here to stay so we can all get to know them. Please, fellow Eurekans, make our visitors feel very welcome. I get the feeling they’re a long way from home and may need some friendly help and advice to find their way round our unusual community.
And finally today: faulty garbage disposal devices across Eureka. The town council has had a number of complaints about the devices not disposing of our garbage, leaving it blowing across our streets. I have looked at the mechanics, which seems to have no fault. Global Dynamics assure me that it was a fault in their system, which has now been rectified. So any problems should be addressed directly to them. So to recap: visitors -make them welcome; and garbage - don’t complain to the council, go straight to Global Dynamics. Have a great week folks!”
There was an audible sigh as the customers in Café Diem realized that the news about the visitors was exactly what was expected: no news, at least not any that Global Dynamics was prepared to share.
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Jayne awoke with an ache in his head that he hadn’t experienced since he went on an all night bender at Betty Lou’s on Pacquin. That time he’d ended up face down in alley with a sore head, and all his money stoled… all thanks to a wily whore and what was called her Goodnight Kiss. He rubbed his sore head as he remembered, that’s why I never kiss ‘em on the mouth.
And now he had another reason; all thanks to Deputy Jo and a well timed head butt.
He grinned as he remembered their tussle earlier. Or was it yesterday? He couldn’t tell. Gorrammit, that woman had gotten him all turned around, till he couldn’t think straight. Not that he ever could, he smiled wryly to himself, think straight, that is. Alls he knew was how much he admired her fightin’ style. Lil’ bitty thing like that flooring him and knockin’ him out cold. Reminded him of another stone cold killer, ‘cept Jo weren’t no moonbrain who had her brain messed about with by the Alliance. She had trained ta fight like that, just like he had. Maybe they had somethin’ in common after all.
He heard footsteps coming closer and opened his eyes, just a crack. “You comin’ ta give me another goin’ over?” he asked.
“Not unless you give me another reason to,” Jo countered. “I got you some aspirin.”
“Aspi-what?”
“Aspirin… well I guess you don’t have it where you come from. It’s pain relief.”
Jayne sighed and rolled up his sleeve.
Jo held her hand open with two small white things resting in her palm.
Jayne looked confused. “Why for?” he asked.
Jo sighed with frustration. “You must be in pain. Just take these. They’ll make you feel better.”
He picked them up and stared at them. He had no idea what to do with them. All he wanted was a smoother to dull the pain some. Where was the shot?
Jo handed him a glass of water and smiled to herself. He looked so confused and was clearly dazed. She must have hit him harder than she imagined. Jo began to feel sorry for this man out of place and out of time.
He took a gulp of water and made no attempt to swallow the tablets.
Jo looked confused now. “Aren’t you going to take them?” she asked.
“Take’ em?” Jayne repeated, “How?”
Ah, he didn’t know how to take tablets. She grabbed a couple of aspirin herself and showed him how to swallow them.
He copied her, unimpressed with the less than instant results.
“You’ll start to feel better in a few minutes,” she explained. “You hungry? Cause I just made some stew.”
“Beef stew?”
Jo nodded.
“Now that I can’t say no to. Can’t remember the last time I tasted real beef.”
She served him up a bowl and they sat together, she at her desk, he on his cell bunk, and ate their stew in companionable silence.
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Mal and Zoe marched into the Sheriff’s office with two goals in mind. The first, to recover their weapons; and the second to get Jayne released from his cell.
They both felt naked without their guns, and visibly relaxed when they had their holsters strapped back on. Jack let them have one firearm each, keeping the others firmly under lock and key.
It was all very well Stark ordering them to release dangerous weaponry to these people from the future, but he and Jo could at least determine how much firepower each person would have.
Jo unlocked the cell door and held it open for Jayne to leave with his crewmates. They exchanged a look of admiration and respect as he walked out.
Jayne now had the unenviable task to choose which firearm to walk out with. Would it be Betty? No, took too long to load in an emergency. How about Veronica? Too short a range. And Vera was too big to use around town. So it had to be Boo. Jayne strapped her on, but looked wistfully back at the girls he was leaving behind, and his grenades. He groaned.
Mal patted him on the back. “Never mind Jayne. We’ll get ‘em back when they figure out how we got here, an’ send us back ta Serenity.”
“Guess so,” Jayne grumbled under his breath.
Jo smiled. She had to admire a man who loved his weaponry almost as much as she loved hers. She stroked the largest weapon in their arsenal. What had Jayne whispered? Vera? So he named his weapons just like she did. Well, Vera, I’d like you to meet Tony, she smiled, putting the strangers weapons alongside her favorite firearm in the gun locker.
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As soon as Kaylee found out that Henry Deacon was the local town mechanic, she headed straight over to his garage to have a look at what he was working on. There was nothing like a little tinkering with an engine to help get her thinking straight again.
Hovering around the entrance, she watched him work on an engine of, what was it called, an automobile? Suddenly she felt shy to enter another mechanics most sacred domain, at least without being invited in.
Henry heard a sound and looked up. “Ahhh! You must be one of our new visitors. Come on in,” he beckoned her closer.
Kaylee watched him in wide eyed wonder, carefully assessing the engine’s capabilities and what he was doing to mend it.
“You interested in engines?” he asked.
Kaylee nodded. “I got natural ability. Engines got workin’s and they speak ta me.”
“You want a closer look?” he moved aside to let her peek under the hood.
“Ain’t never seen one of these combus-ti-on engines before,” she sighed, obviously entranced.
“You don’t have them where you’re from?”
“No sir. It’s all hovercraft and spaceships, except on the most backwater planets on the rim. This runs on gasoline?” she asked.
Henry nodded.
“We learned to convert food waste to power similar engines to these, oh, around 300 years back.”
Henry’s interest was peaked. “If I take you out for a spin, and show you a gas-powered combustion engine in action, would you explain to me this food waste conversion process?”
“Seems like a fair trade,” Kaylee agreed. “The name’s Kaywinnet Lee Frye, but folks just call me Kaylee.”
“Nice to meet you Kaylee. My name’s Henry Deacon. Just call me Henry.”
They shook hand to seal the pact.
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Wash, River, Simon, Inara and Book explored the streets of their new town. They found themselves outside Café Diem, and wandered inside.
The usually busy café was filled with a deathly silence.
“Does anyone else feel like we shouldn’t be here?” Wash asked nervously.
“Nonsense,” said Book. “We have as much right to be here as anyone else.”
Inara walked up to the counter. “Do you serve Green Tea?”
“We certainly do,” said Vincent who was enchanted by this regal young woman. “We have Chung Mee; Long Tseng; Golden Bamboo Hairpoint; Jade in the Clouds; Peony Rosettes; River of Clouds; Spring Plums; Genmaicha; Gyokuro Dew Drops; Hougicha; Kokeicha; Spider’s Legs; Gunpowder Green; House Japanese Green; White Tea; Ceylon; Darjeeling; Jasmine; Ginger; Fennel; Mint and Lemon Green Tea. We also have Green tea with Echinacea, if you’re coming down with a cold; Green Tea with Ginseng, which also boosts the immune system; and Green tea with Gingko, which is good for poor circulation. Or we have some wonderfully relaxing Indian Chai. What would you like?”
Inara was amazed that they sold her favourite green tea - the exquisite Jade in the Clouds, which she only had once, with the mother of the very first Companion house she ever worked in.
“Jade in the Clouds, please.”
“Ah, you have exquisite taste. That is our very finest most subtle green tea, bought straight from China.”
As he prepared Inara’s tea in the traditional Chinese way, Vincent turned to the other visitors. “What would you like?”
“Coffee, strong and black,” Wash answered.
“Chai, please,” said Book.
“Genmaicha,” Simon chose.
“River of Clouds,” said River with a smile.
“Are you sure you should be having that, River?”
“Boob!” she answered, ignoring her brother. “River of Clouds,” she insisted.
Vincent set Inara’s tea in front of her in a traditional Chinese tea set. Wash’s coffee was in an enormous mug, very hot and strong. The Chai and Genmaicha came each in their own pot for Book and Simon. And finally River’s tea came in the traditional Chinese way.
“Free refills for as long as you stay, by the way,” Vincent told them with a smile.
Just at that moment Stark walked in.
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