Before the Worst
Title: Before the Worst
Rating:: PG-13
Fandom/Pairing Firefly: Mal, genfic
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue, don't take this too seriously.
Summary: Written for hc_bingo prompt, "earth blowing up, escaping into space," for samb_ca , who requested a Mal story about a billionty years ago. Sorry it took so long, dearie!
Earth That Was ended a long time ago, but not so long anyone's forgotten. It was the last time every human in the universe could've said they were from the same place.
Way back before anything, back before he'd even left school, Mal had studied the last days on Earth That Was. About the scientists competing to come up with the best design, about the corporations and governments that warred over their production, and about the people who rioted in the streets trying to get on board the first ships. The pilots and navigators who'd gone back for more and more and more.
It had seemed strange, back then, that nobody ever talked about the people who'd been left behind. He'd been young. It hadn't occurred to him that even if there'd been someone there to record it, there'd been no gettin' it out.
And that's what he's thinking about right now, as Kaylee ushers another towards Inara's shuttle. Down on the ground, Zoe's trying to keep the crowd under control while Wash is hopefully nearly finished moving Badger's stolen cargo out of sight and into the engine room.
River, for her part, is probably scaring the hell out of the three pregnant women down in the infirmary, and the only reason she's on her own is that Mal needs Simon doing triage on the ground.
And Simon's job is going to be nearly as bad as Mal's today- maybe worse, it's too soon to tell. He's got to identify those who are healthy enough to make the trip, and who might not be.
Regardless, there are way too many people who've already been cleared, massed up for the lottery. They're startin' to get restless.
That ain't true. They passed restless and uneasy and nervous more'n an hour ago, and are hingin' on panic, now, just waiting to blow.
They're not all that much different than the volcano two hills over, and when he hears the crackling, his heart stops. It's just the speaker on the wall. It's just Wash.
"Okay, we're stocked, secure, and baby-proofed, and we've got a little over-no, wait, make that not quite an hour- ta ma de- before the top blows off, but. I'm heading up, and we're ready to go soon's you give the order."
"Alright, stand by." It's the closest thing he's given to an order in a while, now. He's been standin' here, watching uselessly, for so long that he actually notices it. Tryin' to shake the feeling off, he waves Zoe down.
With a nod that looks nearly relieved, she takes his post guarding the bay. He does what he can to skirt the crowd, but there are so many people, so many wantin' to plead their case, and they don't have the time to hear any of them. He has to find Simon, first.
By the time Mal makes his way to the back of the crowd, he's coughing nearly as bad as everyone, Simon included.
"Been out here too long."
"We all have, Captain," Simon doesn't look up from the woman he's examining as he frowns. "Their doctor's staying behind, I sent him back inside to find painkillers and tranquilizers and anything that'll make the impending-" Simon shakes himself and hands the woman a lottery ticket, and already, he's waving the next person forward. "He's in his office trying to find painkillers and, well, more comfortable ways to die than suffocating on poisoned air. What's our timeline?"
Glancing up at the volcano, he can see that it's going to be close, but there are only a dozen or so people left. It'll be tight, and there are already far more people, here, than the ship can hold, especially once all the children are on board.
"We'll get these last people into the lottery, and then we'll start. What do you need me to do?"
Simon thrusts a thermometer into his hand and nods towards the smaller crowd waiting on the other side of the distressingly weak looking fence, where Jayne's trying to keep the peace with a rough scrap of fabric tied around his face. "If it's in the red, they're out, if it's green, send them to me."
He radios Zoe, tells her and Kaylee to help get the children on board, and moves over to the first person standing in Simon's line.
---
The crowd's in an uproar, shoving against one another and the weak barricades set along the edges. By the time Mal makes it back to the ship, Zoe's still looking like she hasn't had time to breathe in days, and it's not just the ash in the air. Her eyes, though, are mostly shot through with regret. She knows as well as he did what's been coming.
And now it's here.
Soon as Wash has him patched into the public address system, he begins.
"Okay, everyone, we need this to go quickly and quietly. We'll take on as many as we can hold safely, can't afford delays due to fighting. If it don't run smooth, we might wind up havin' to take off with less than a full load, so…" He swallows over the ash in his throat. "I'm sorry this is happening, to all of you. But we've got to start, now."
Zoe's got the canister in her hands, now, and she's holding it up for him. He reaches inside, pulls a ticket out. "The first number is 287."
---
They manage to get ninety-three people on board. They could've fit two dozen more, and the last thing he sees, as they begin to take off with the hatch drawing closed, is the riot coming to a head on the ground below.
It won't last long.
Simon pushes his way through towards him, coughing a little, his voice a near whisper. "At least they'll wear themselves out more quickly." Mal's about to round on him, can practically see his knuckles sinking into Simon's face, but when he glances over he can see the bitterness there. Simon already gets it.
And there are ninety-three very panicked people on his ship, now. He's got other matters to attend to.
---
They'll be touching down on Haven in thirteen hours, and when Book's wave comes through, confirming again that all are welcome, that they're already setting up space for them, it should be a bigger relief than it is.
Kaylee and Inara are in the shuttle, helping reunite some parents with their children, trying to sooth the children who've probably been orphans for three hours now. They're not having much luck, if River can be believed, and Mal honestly doesn’t know if he has it in them to go see.
According to Simon, two of the women have gone into labor. He says it's stress related.
He finds Wash circulating through the crowd, helping them get themselves situated, talking inanities, trying to keep their minds off it. When that fails, Jayne's the one breaking up the fights, though he looks angry enough that he could probably start a few, if he felt like it.
They're the kind of things Mal should've probably been doing himself. Or Zoe, at least.
"Please tell me someone's flying the ship."
"Zoe needed some alone time, she's up there now." Wash frowns. "Ah. I don't know if she's tired, yet, but…"
"I'll go check on her," relieved at being pointed to go somewhere, do something.
---
They do what they can, for as long as they have to. They land on Haven long enough to get everyone off, to help get them moved into the refugee camp that's still not finished. Nobody talks about it, Mal's not even sure a formal decision's been made, but they're in the sky again two hours later.
They deal.
---
He sets to straightening the bay as soon as Wash takes the controls, and after a while, Jayne wanders in and starts helping. Shifting crates and equipment back into space, eradicating all evidence of their most recent job.
Inara's in her shuttle, alone now, and when he wanders past, he can smell incense burning. He decides not to intrude.
He has no idea where the others are, but he can hear them, now and then. He's not sure, but he thinks Kaylee was crying, a while ago in her bunk. It's awful.
---
It's another day and a half before they're all in the kitchen at the same time, ostensibly to eat dinner and talk about how they're going to get the shipment back to the judge back on Lauck, but nobody's heart is in it. Even Jayne's just pickin' at his food.
River is the only one who doesn't seem to understand, casting quizzical glances around the table as she finishes her food, humming to herself. It's starting to make Mal uneasy, and it's worse when she finally begins to speak.
"If you take out the seventeen percent who made their own choice to stay behind, and the four percent who wouldn't have survived the trip, you saved fifty-three percent of the people on the planet."
Under Jayne's glare, Simon tries to quiet River, while Wash stares at the table.
"Ain't good enough," Mal summarizes, hoping she'll drop it.
"On Earth That Was, it's estimated that less than a twelfth of the planet's population escaped, and they knew which way the wind was blowing. We didn't even have a breeze when we set down, not one that amounted to anything, unless you count the westward-."
"River," Simon starts, taking her arm, but she shakes it off, backs up and away from the table.
"I'm trying to make it better, but I can't. So I'm trying to make it feel better, and you're all anchors on rusty chains, too heavy to be moved and if you don't want to move, then stop pretending to try."
Mal rubs a hand over his face and rocks back in his chair, finding the words. "What, Albatross, you aim to have us go back there?"
She frowns, then, cocks her head as if she's never seen him before. "Why? There's nothing left."
Jayne's set on jumping over the table to grab her, and Mal doesn't even realize that his hand's going to his hip until he catches Zoe tensing, but Simon is the first to react.
"River, I know there's- Look. Now's not the time to talk about it."
"Fa kuang nu hai." Jayne mutters, but he sits back in his seat, crossing his arms as River strides out of the room, and it's clear that he's going to say something stupid, but Zoe's there first, silencing him with a glare.
---
Mal's at the controls, looking out over a whole lot of nothing, out here, and hasn't had a thought interrupting his head for a while, now. He doesn't even notice it until River's standing next to him, toyin' with one of Wash's dinosaurs.
"Simon told me I should apologize because I think you don't have anything to apologize for other than wanting to apologize."
"Don't reckon what we want makes much of a difference." He's too tired to look up at her, but he makes the attempt, anyway, and finding her shaking her head is starting to feel a mite bit patronizing, but it ain't worth mentioning.
"Fifty three percent is a much better success rate than they would've expected on their own. More than that is just greedy. And it's already three days later, down on Haven." She disappears again, then, quick as she came. As far as attempts to set a man's mind at ease go, she'll never win any awards.
But he gets it, now. It's no longer the worst day of their lives- the worst was over with. And it ain't never been the worst of Mal's.
And in the morning, when they wake up, it'll be anther day's worth of time gone by. By mid-afternoon, another crisis will probably pop up. Maybe it'll be all this, with River trying to make everyone feel better, that'll finally come to some sort of messy head. Maybe it'll be an Alliance cruiser swinging too close out of nowhere. Another repair that Kaylee won't be able to fix mid-flight.
And maybe Mal's got to be ready for whatever's coming next. Be ready to move on when he needs to, because he's not sure if Serenity's seen her worst days, yet. They might still be coming.
But for now, she's still flying. It's got to be enough.
Rating:: PG-13
Fandom/Pairing Firefly: Mal, genfic
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue, don't take this too seriously.
Summary: Written for hc_bingo prompt, "earth blowing up, escaping into space," for samb_ca , who requested a Mal story about a billionty years ago. Sorry it took so long, dearie!
Earth That Was ended a long time ago, but not so long anyone's forgotten. It was the last time every human in the universe could've said they were from the same place.
Way back before anything, back before he'd even left school, Mal had studied the last days on Earth That Was. About the scientists competing to come up with the best design, about the corporations and governments that warred over their production, and about the people who rioted in the streets trying to get on board the first ships. The pilots and navigators who'd gone back for more and more and more.
It had seemed strange, back then, that nobody ever talked about the people who'd been left behind. He'd been young. It hadn't occurred to him that even if there'd been someone there to record it, there'd been no gettin' it out.
And that's what he's thinking about right now, as Kaylee ushers another towards Inara's shuttle. Down on the ground, Zoe's trying to keep the crowd under control while Wash is hopefully nearly finished moving Badger's stolen cargo out of sight and into the engine room.
River, for her part, is probably scaring the hell out of the three pregnant women down in the infirmary, and the only reason she's on her own is that Mal needs Simon doing triage on the ground.
And Simon's job is going to be nearly as bad as Mal's today- maybe worse, it's too soon to tell. He's got to identify those who are healthy enough to make the trip, and who might not be.
Regardless, there are way too many people who've already been cleared, massed up for the lottery. They're startin' to get restless.
That ain't true. They passed restless and uneasy and nervous more'n an hour ago, and are hingin' on panic, now, just waiting to blow.
They're not all that much different than the volcano two hills over, and when he hears the crackling, his heart stops. It's just the speaker on the wall. It's just Wash.
"Okay, we're stocked, secure, and baby-proofed, and we've got a little over-no, wait, make that not quite an hour- ta ma de- before the top blows off, but. I'm heading up, and we're ready to go soon's you give the order."
"Alright, stand by." It's the closest thing he's given to an order in a while, now. He's been standin' here, watching uselessly, for so long that he actually notices it. Tryin' to shake the feeling off, he waves Zoe down.
With a nod that looks nearly relieved, she takes his post guarding the bay. He does what he can to skirt the crowd, but there are so many people, so many wantin' to plead their case, and they don't have the time to hear any of them. He has to find Simon, first.
By the time Mal makes his way to the back of the crowd, he's coughing nearly as bad as everyone, Simon included.
"Been out here too long."
"We all have, Captain," Simon doesn't look up from the woman he's examining as he frowns. "Their doctor's staying behind, I sent him back inside to find painkillers and tranquilizers and anything that'll make the impending-" Simon shakes himself and hands the woman a lottery ticket, and already, he's waving the next person forward. "He's in his office trying to find painkillers and, well, more comfortable ways to die than suffocating on poisoned air. What's our timeline?"
Glancing up at the volcano, he can see that it's going to be close, but there are only a dozen or so people left. It'll be tight, and there are already far more people, here, than the ship can hold, especially once all the children are on board.
"We'll get these last people into the lottery, and then we'll start. What do you need me to do?"
Simon thrusts a thermometer into his hand and nods towards the smaller crowd waiting on the other side of the distressingly weak looking fence, where Jayne's trying to keep the peace with a rough scrap of fabric tied around his face. "If it's in the red, they're out, if it's green, send them to me."
He radios Zoe, tells her and Kaylee to help get the children on board, and moves over to the first person standing in Simon's line.
---
The crowd's in an uproar, shoving against one another and the weak barricades set along the edges. By the time Mal makes it back to the ship, Zoe's still looking like she hasn't had time to breathe in days, and it's not just the ash in the air. Her eyes, though, are mostly shot through with regret. She knows as well as he did what's been coming.
And now it's here.
Soon as Wash has him patched into the public address system, he begins.
"Okay, everyone, we need this to go quickly and quietly. We'll take on as many as we can hold safely, can't afford delays due to fighting. If it don't run smooth, we might wind up havin' to take off with less than a full load, so…" He swallows over the ash in his throat. "I'm sorry this is happening, to all of you. But we've got to start, now."
Zoe's got the canister in her hands, now, and she's holding it up for him. He reaches inside, pulls a ticket out. "The first number is 287."
---
They manage to get ninety-three people on board. They could've fit two dozen more, and the last thing he sees, as they begin to take off with the hatch drawing closed, is the riot coming to a head on the ground below.
It won't last long.
Simon pushes his way through towards him, coughing a little, his voice a near whisper. "At least they'll wear themselves out more quickly." Mal's about to round on him, can practically see his knuckles sinking into Simon's face, but when he glances over he can see the bitterness there. Simon already gets it.
And there are ninety-three very panicked people on his ship, now. He's got other matters to attend to.
---
They'll be touching down on Haven in thirteen hours, and when Book's wave comes through, confirming again that all are welcome, that they're already setting up space for them, it should be a bigger relief than it is.
Kaylee and Inara are in the shuttle, helping reunite some parents with their children, trying to sooth the children who've probably been orphans for three hours now. They're not having much luck, if River can be believed, and Mal honestly doesn’t know if he has it in them to go see.
According to Simon, two of the women have gone into labor. He says it's stress related.
He finds Wash circulating through the crowd, helping them get themselves situated, talking inanities, trying to keep their minds off it. When that fails, Jayne's the one breaking up the fights, though he looks angry enough that he could probably start a few, if he felt like it.
They're the kind of things Mal should've probably been doing himself. Or Zoe, at least.
"Please tell me someone's flying the ship."
"Zoe needed some alone time, she's up there now." Wash frowns. "Ah. I don't know if she's tired, yet, but…"
"I'll go check on her," relieved at being pointed to go somewhere, do something.
---
They do what they can, for as long as they have to. They land on Haven long enough to get everyone off, to help get them moved into the refugee camp that's still not finished. Nobody talks about it, Mal's not even sure a formal decision's been made, but they're in the sky again two hours later.
They deal.
---
He sets to straightening the bay as soon as Wash takes the controls, and after a while, Jayne wanders in and starts helping. Shifting crates and equipment back into space, eradicating all evidence of their most recent job.
Inara's in her shuttle, alone now, and when he wanders past, he can smell incense burning. He decides not to intrude.
He has no idea where the others are, but he can hear them, now and then. He's not sure, but he thinks Kaylee was crying, a while ago in her bunk. It's awful.
---
It's another day and a half before they're all in the kitchen at the same time, ostensibly to eat dinner and talk about how they're going to get the shipment back to the judge back on Lauck, but nobody's heart is in it. Even Jayne's just pickin' at his food.
River is the only one who doesn't seem to understand, casting quizzical glances around the table as she finishes her food, humming to herself. It's starting to make Mal uneasy, and it's worse when she finally begins to speak.
"If you take out the seventeen percent who made their own choice to stay behind, and the four percent who wouldn't have survived the trip, you saved fifty-three percent of the people on the planet."
Under Jayne's glare, Simon tries to quiet River, while Wash stares at the table.
"Ain't good enough," Mal summarizes, hoping she'll drop it.
"On Earth That Was, it's estimated that less than a twelfth of the planet's population escaped, and they knew which way the wind was blowing. We didn't even have a breeze when we set down, not one that amounted to anything, unless you count the westward-."
"River," Simon starts, taking her arm, but she shakes it off, backs up and away from the table.
"I'm trying to make it better, but I can't. So I'm trying to make it feel better, and you're all anchors on rusty chains, too heavy to be moved and if you don't want to move, then stop pretending to try."
Mal rubs a hand over his face and rocks back in his chair, finding the words. "What, Albatross, you aim to have us go back there?"
She frowns, then, cocks her head as if she's never seen him before. "Why? There's nothing left."
Jayne's set on jumping over the table to grab her, and Mal doesn't even realize that his hand's going to his hip until he catches Zoe tensing, but Simon is the first to react.
"River, I know there's- Look. Now's not the time to talk about it."
"Fa kuang nu hai." Jayne mutters, but he sits back in his seat, crossing his arms as River strides out of the room, and it's clear that he's going to say something stupid, but Zoe's there first, silencing him with a glare.
---
Mal's at the controls, looking out over a whole lot of nothing, out here, and hasn't had a thought interrupting his head for a while, now. He doesn't even notice it until River's standing next to him, toyin' with one of Wash's dinosaurs.
"Simon told me I should apologize because I think you don't have anything to apologize for other than wanting to apologize."
"Don't reckon what we want makes much of a difference." He's too tired to look up at her, but he makes the attempt, anyway, and finding her shaking her head is starting to feel a mite bit patronizing, but it ain't worth mentioning.
"Fifty three percent is a much better success rate than they would've expected on their own. More than that is just greedy. And it's already three days later, down on Haven." She disappears again, then, quick as she came. As far as attempts to set a man's mind at ease go, she'll never win any awards.
But he gets it, now. It's no longer the worst day of their lives- the worst was over with. And it ain't never been the worst of Mal's.
And in the morning, when they wake up, it'll be anther day's worth of time gone by. By mid-afternoon, another crisis will probably pop up. Maybe it'll be all this, with River trying to make everyone feel better, that'll finally come to some sort of messy head. Maybe it'll be an Alliance cruiser swinging too close out of nowhere. Another repair that Kaylee won't be able to fix mid-flight.
And maybe Mal's got to be ready for whatever's coming next. Be ready to move on when he needs to, because he's not sure if Serenity's seen her worst days, yet. They might still be coming.
But for now, she's still flying. It's got to be enough.