Fic: Above and Beyond (3/3)
Above and Beyond (3/3)
~*~
And Wash realized he now had nothing useful to do, and that it was just him and Zoe and a pistol with seven bullets. Of course, Zoe by her lonesome, let alone with a pistol and seven bullets, was nothing to sneeze at. He glanced up at her, a thought forming in his brain that maybe she could slide down the backside of this hill to the mule while he set up some sort of diversion. 'Cause she could be sneaky that way. And him, not so much.
But the return glance she gave him was as stubborn a one as he'd ever seen from her, and she said, “Mal will be back soon.” Then she looked beyond him, bracing her wrist on rock as she fired downhill.
“Okay,” he replied, but he had a thought which he hated, which was that if he weren't a factor in this equation, that she'd be striking off on her own, slipping stealthily away, now that she no longer had to cover Mal. Then he was wondering how big a wrench their worrying about him had thrown into the finely-tuned mechanism of their combat partnership. Would they have tried talking their way out of this if he hadn't been in the picture? And negotiating now, given he'd probably killed one of them, on top of however many Zoe'd punctured, was probably right out. With the shuttle gone, the only thing their attackers had left to gain was vengeance.
As he tied himself in mental knots, Zoe continued to lay down careful, well-timed fire, encouraging their foe to move slowly and cautiously, buying her and Wash all the time she could. Wash couldn't help counting every shot. When she got down to one, he swallowed, knowing without Zoe's deadly defensive fire, as soon as they worked up their nerve, that the bandits would move in. “I'm sorry,” he said. “I'm so sorry I didn't think to bring extra magazines. I coulda chucked a couple in the pack.”
“They don't know y' didn't. Don't even know how many we might have left in this magazine. Could be one, three, hell, even seventeen. Don't know exactly what I'm shootin'. Could even have yet another piece. So they ain't gonna be takin' chances.” She took a moment to gaze down into his eyes, and say, with serene confidence, “He's comin', Wash, don't fret.”
Wash had no doubt Mal was on his way. Absolutely none. He knew absolutely Mal would soon arrive - provided, of course, he hadn't already crashed and killed himself. How soon, really, was his only concern. 'Cause the cavalry charging gallantly over the hill was only so useful if the fort had already been wiped out.
He was thinking about trying to squirm around, out of the backpack, to get to the gorram spanner that had been gouging under his left shoulder-blade this whole time, 'cause it would make a shiny club. Then he winced as the tinnitus in his ears reached a fever pitch. But it was singing in two separate octaves, and he suddenly realized the lower one was in the shuttle thruster range.
And Mal did, indeed, come charging over the hill, swooping up the back side of it, and overshooting them wildly. The jets roared as he tried to stop and turn back, and then the shuttle was spinning like a top.
“Ai ya. Women wanle,” Zoe muttered, craning her neck around to watch. Wash could only nod. With all the safety systems off, the craft had no auto stabilizers and every twitch of the stick would feed into a quick and forceful response. Delicacy was the key, and Mal didn't have much of that.
The spinning stopped abruptly, and Wash worried about whiplash, but then the shuttle was moving - well, wallowing violently, really, like a ship in a storm whipped sea - to hover over their position. And Wash could hear Mal bellowing though the open hatch, though he couldn't make out his words, but he figured they were along the lines of, “Get your asses in here now!”
Then they were standing, moving, and Wash yelled, “Jump!” as he grabbed Zoe's hips and launched her toward the opening in the wildly rocking craft. She did, and slid in, lithe as an eel, and he leapt after her, fingers finding the edge of the hatch, clamping down, as the swing of the shuttle jerked him upward. He dangled a moment, then heaved with all his strength, managing to get himself flopped on his belly over the hatch rim, hoping he wasn't about to catch a round in the ass, 'cause bullets were ringing off the metal hull, and he must have been presenting a perfect target.
And his fingers tightened spasmodically, as his upper body, now in the zero gravity established by the screen, provided no counterweight to his legs, still outside its effect. And Mal must have set the shuttle to spinning again, because a lot of centripetal force was happening, pulling hard on his feet. He gave another frantic heave, just as Zoe's hand closed on his collar. He caught a glimpse of her, other hand gripping the safety bar by the hatch, both boots braced on the hull against the equal-but-opposite forces she created as she smoothly hauled him inside.
His heave and her pull had him sailing across the shuttle, and he managed to tuck his head to one side so he hit the back of the pilot's seat with his shoulder, not his face. He quickly wrapped his arms around it to keep from bouncing backwards, maybe even out the hatch.
“Qingwa cao de liumang, Wash!” Mal yelled, sounding a tad on the excited side. “Don't jostle me! Damn near killed myself a dozen times already!”
Muttering “Sorry, sorry, sorry,” Wash carefully swung himself to the left side of the chair, hanging on with white knuckled fists, as he shot anxious looks out the front view screen. He was relieved to see they had some altitude, Mal apparently focusing - wisely - on getting a lot of air between them and the rocks below. How much altitude would soon become worrisome, as, without power and under zero G, closing the hatch manually would be difficult and dangerous. So they needed to stay low enough so there was something breathable coming through that hatch. But Mal wasn't doing so well laterally, weaving and rocking them from side to side with his jerky over-control of the stick.
“Mal, let me get in there.”
Mal darted him a grateful look, and took his right hand off the thrusters' controls, going for the buckle of the restraints in the middle of his chest.
“No!” Wash exclaimed in alarm. “Stay secured! Just let me slide in front of you.” And then there was a slow, cautious shift of Wash's right hand to the stick, as Mal's left moved off it to bunch in the loose fabric at Wash's left hip as he drifted carefully between Mal's knees and the helm. Taking the stick in his other hand, Wash reached with his free one for the thrusters' power feed, Mal relinquishing control to grab Wash's flightsuit at his other hip, drawing him down onto his thighs, steadying him. Out of the corner of his eye, Wash could see Zoe pulling herself hand over hand into the crew chair, maneuvering her long legs around to get her butt into the seat, slinging the restraints over her shoulders.
And for the first time since he'd gotten Zoe's mayday, Wash felt at ease, as his body found the rhythm of his craft, one calming hand on the stick, the other on the jets' feed. The horizon before him ceased its gyrating, and he backed the thrusters off, letting them sink a little, to where the air was a tad thicker. He heard Mal sigh deeply behind him, and Wash guessed he was somewhat relieved to relinquish his piloting duties. Although Wash had to admit, he'd really risen to the occasion, and he'd be happy to tell him so.
A sudden eruption of laughter from the crew seat had both Wash's and Mal's heads jerking around to Zoe. Their concerned expressions got her going even harder, and she placed one hand on her stomach, trying to catch her breath, while she pointed at the two of them with the other.
Then Wash clicked on what had set her off; her husband sitting on her captain's lap, both no doubt with faces set in intent, serious, adult lines. Wash started laughing too, and then Mal did, which then had them both bouncing in the seat, which made Mal wrap both arms around Wash's waist, as best he could, as Wash was still wearing the pack, to keep him from bouncing clean free. Which made Zoe laugh even harder, and she looked pretty wild too, the tears from her eyes floating, tiny diamond spheres, in front of her face, the escaped locks of her hair standing up around her head, waving like some underwater plant.
“Oh, my God, stop, please,” Wash choked out. “I'm gonna crash us and we'll all die. And they'll find me in Mal's lap, and all our reputations will be ruined.”
This struck Zoe and Mal as hilarious, and Wash had to focus really, really hard, shaken by Mal's deep belly laughter and his own snorted guffaws, to keep the shuttle flying smooth. It took them until Wash was easing them down in an open patch of gravel some fifteen meters from Serenity to collect themselves.
“We don't have to tell the others about this part,” Mal informed them, sniffing, unwrapping his right arm to swab his sleeve over his eyes.
“Oh, hell, yeah, we do,” Zoe replied, swatting teardrops away from in front of her face.
“Aw, gorramit,” Wash said, suddenly remembering. “The mule. I left the mule back there.” His hand had been on the toggle to cut the grav screen, but he moved it back to the thrusters' feed. “Should we go back and get it?”
“No!” Mal and Zoe barked together, and startled, Wash yanked his hand away. Then, more calmly, Mal continued, “We'll get the mule, but not in this thing.”
Wash shrugged, said, “Okay,” and turned off the grav screen.
“Oof,” Mal grunted, as Wash's 70-something kilos, plus the backpack, settled down on top of him.
Wash let the following hurly-burly flow around him, smiling and laughing and commenting at the right time. His input to the stories were about Zoe's amazing landing and Mal's fancy flying. He had one very bad moment, as Zoe described events from their side of the little adventure and he realized the part with the guy surprising them from behind was coming up. His stomach clenched into an icy knot, 'cause he was just not ready to have the discussion that he knew that particular event would spark. He caught Zoe's eye, giving his head a little shake. And though she cocked him a quizzical look, she understood his silent plea, and skipped over that bit. After she'd finished up, having painted a vivid picture of Wash piloting perched on Mal's knees, and Jayne and Kaylee'd caught their breaths after a good laugh, Kaylee looked at him, eyes wide and expectant. Shrugging, he gave her a slanting grin, and said, “I spent all my time pinned under Zoe.”
“Nothin' much different there then,” Jayne quipped with a smirk.
Wash laughed easily as Kaylee leapt to his defense, slugging Jayne on the shoulder, not at all prepared to take umbrage on his own behalf. Given history to date, ninety-nine point ninety-five percent of the occasions he'd spent pinned under Zoe had been well worth his time. Hers too, he was pretty sure. And he found no need to deny that pleasurable fact to Jayne.
He got the shuttle docked, and then they went to get the mule back, and he would have liked to have seen Jayne dangling at the end of a line as he was winched down to it. But he was alone at the helm, holding Serenity rock steady as Jayne spidered down, then the mule was hauled up, and then Jayne. Mule's engine had been stripped, the tires slashed, and Kaylee was pretty certain someone had peed on it. Wash assured her it wasn't him.
He did most of all this on personal auto-pilot, as he thought things through. He'd only ever pointed a gun at a living person once before, and he hadn't been able to pull the trigger then. Figured if he had, if he had shot that terrified Alliance second lieutenant in the face when he'd had the chance, he could have escaped, avoiding those years in lock-up. Even that though, that long purgatory, he still thought was worth that kid's life. (It was funny, Wash realized, how he'd always thought of the guy as a kid, although chances were he'd been in the same age range as Wash's then twenty-two. Something about the huge, terror-rounded eyes and plump, Core-soft face.) And, the man had done him a favor as well, after Wash had realized his only choices were murder or surrender, and had chosen the latter, by confiscating his pistol, and never bringing it up again. So that Wash was tried only for smuggling medical supplies, instead of on a weapons charge, or even worse, arms smuggling. 'Cause there had been a real hard-ass prosecutor on his case, and he would have painted that pistol in the worst possible light, if that louie hadn't concealed it.
Then he was busy lifting them out of atmo, and plotting in a course for the quick jump to the next moon over to pick up Inara. That jump was more fuel efficient done manually rather than on autopilot, so he stayed on the bridge for that, contacting Inara when they were about a half hour away. She'd completed her business, so it was just a quick touch-down to pick her up, and then they were back in the Black, him plotting in a course for Greenleaf.
He'd done that, and put them on auto, and had allowed himself be drawn into the stars, wrist draped lazily over the yoke, when he heard footsteps behind him. He turned and was surprised to see Zoe, because he usually didn't hear her coming, but then saw she might have been focused on not spilling whatever was in the bowl she was carrying. She offered it to him and he took it automatically.
“What's this?” he asked, cradling the very warm dish in his palms. He studied the liquid within, a thick, opaque green. While the color proved a tad disquieting, the scent rising up on the steam was quite tantalizing.
“You missed dinner. There's left-overs, but it's that blue protein. Stuff's nasty cold, even nastier reheated. So I made you soup.”
“You made me soup?” He raised his eyes to hers, brows lifted in surprise.
“A wife can make her husband soup,” she replied, moving behind his chair. “'Specially one goin' above and beyond.” Her arms circled his neck, busy fingers tucking a napkin under his chin.
“A wife can do just about whatever the heck she wants,” he asserted, while processing, processing. Then he twisted his head around to squint up at her. “Above and beyond?”
It had come to him that perhaps she was rewarding him for shooting, maybe killing, a man. And he wouldn't argue that he hadn't done exactly what needed doing. If someone pointed a gun at Zoe, and Wash had a gun in his own hand, he'd shoot at that person. He'd probably hit them, too, just as he'd done today, as he'd handled guns before and was good at anything which required hand/eye co-ordination. But that was a terrible thing to do. Necessary. But terrible. And not something to be rewarded for.
Something in his eyes seemed to give her pause, because she became very still, studying his face for a moment, before saying carefully, “You really kept your head there, Wash. Y' had all sorts of things to juggle - taking charge of Serenity, making all the right choices in getting yourself out to the shuttle, coaching Mal while under fire.” She shifted around, so she was looking at him face to face. Her hand came down to lightly cup his jaw. “That guy coming up behind us. You did good.”
“Good,” he repeated tonelessly. He didn't know whether to turn his face away from or into her palm. He didn't know if this was a gesture of approval for having killed someone. Or if it was as she said, she'd been impressed by how he'd handled the various events of the day. Or if maybe she was just showing him she loved him no matter what, wanted to give him a little domestic-type treat to center him after he'd been pushed outside his usual role. Or none of those things.
He didn't know. There were lots of times where he didn't know where Zoe was coming from. So he decided to simply enjoy his soup.
“Smells xiang,” he said, arm snaking around her waist, drawing her onto his lap. Smiling, she shaped herself to him, tucking herself to the outside of his shoulder so he could have both hands in front of him to eat his soup.
And he was going to slowly savor every single spoonful. Heck, maybe he'd even be uncouth and lick the bowl clean. But then, then, he fully intended to take his wife to their bunk and show her, explicitly and in great detail, exactly what the phrase, 'above and beyond' really meant.
~*~
Chinese translations
Ai ya - damn, darn
Feng le - crazy
Gou cao de - dog humping
Lao tien ye - God, Heaven
Qingwa cao de liumang - frog humping punk
Tianwang bu yao - Heaven forfend
Tzao gao - damn it
Women wanle. - We're in big trouble.
Xiang - delicious