Pride
Graphic by tainted_sanity
This is for Dyce, who demanded some Rayne smut reciprocity :-D
Title: The Silent Place Beyond Pride
Firefly; Rayne; Adult: Graphic Sexual Situations; Not BDM compliant; 2100 words
Summary: Four of their number are taken and presumed dead. Escape was the easy part.
Disclaimer: Not mine. Joss is the creator of the characters and the ‘verse and the creative genius that inspires me to write. I’m only playing with the toys in his sandbox until he gets back and kicks me out.
Note 1: This is a little off centre for me and maybe a little dark and squicky. In any case, this isn’t fluff and the situations contained within might be disturbing to some. I’m not offended if you skip this one.
Note 2: This is in response to crazywriterchic’s Evil Challenge. My theme is Pride and I believe I have included all of the five senses and the fic takes place someplace other than one of their bunks.
Note 3: Many thanks to Ceslas for taking the time to beta this for me. I have edited this story and added to it in response to her insightful comments.
Jayne looked down at his arms and legs - not a scratch. Not even a bruise, much less any bullet holes. He was, in point of fact, a picture of health. Skin stretched taught over muscles honed to perfection. And yet, lying on Death’s door would be preferable to this. Caged naked in an empty glass box, he was on display for anyone who cared to walk by and take a glance.
They were lined up in glass cells, him, the moonbrain, Zoë and Wash, with corridors on either side. All of them naked, and all of them alone. Inara, Kaylee and the doc, led by Mal, were their only hope - and Jayne didn’t consider that to be much hope. He didn’t even know if they’d escaped capture or death. He didn’t know anything except that Niska was saving him and the three members of Serenity he could see, to torture later.
They were waiting for a painful death. Waiting without anything to comfort them - not even their pride.
Who knew how long they waited. Days? Weeks? Months? The lights were always on and there was no pattern to the delivery of food or the cleaning of waste. They were in a timeless state, like mice in a freezer waiting to be fed to a snake. And yet the moment did arrive when the first of them was taken. River, in the middle of a dance to music only she could hear, was taken from her cell. Jayne watched as she went docilely along with the ever-silent guards. A look back at the others showed a stoic and pinched lipped Zoë and a weeping Wash. Jayne just pounded his fists ineffectually against the glass.
If he had bothered trying to keep time, he would have known that it was only 20 minutes - but apathy to the passage of time had set in long ago. But still, he knew it hadn’t been that long when River returned to them. Bloody, but it was not her blood. Naked, but in full possession of her pride. Jayne watched her, in awe of her, as she opened first Wash’s cell, then Zoë’s and finally Jayne’s.
Silently - words had fallen into disuse - they followed her through a maze of corridors and bodies whose lives had ended abruptly to a docking bay where their shuttle remained unused. She pointed to a pile of crates and Jayne and Zoë obeyed her directive and began to load them onto the shuttle. Wouldn’t do to return to Serenity without a decent cargo, after all. Poor payment for what they’d suffered, but they took the goods all the same.
Wash was already at the controls, assessing the readiness of the shuttle for take off. Jayne topped off the cargo with as many fuel cells as he could find and the ship would hold while Zoë dug through the lockers for rations. River was lining the remaining fuel cells up and linking them to the power source. If she did it right, and River always did it right, the entire station would blow not long after they left.
The four of them crowded into the tiny cockpit, not caring if their naked bodies touched. They stared through the window at the fiery blast of Niska’s space station. The flames quickly extinguished in the vacuum of space and soon there was nothing left of Niska or his grisly crew but fine debris. They hovered for a moment as no one had mentioned a destination and River finally broke the silence. “Persephone,” she murmured.
Wash nodded. It was a stretch for a simple shuttle, but they’d piled on plenty of fuel cells. A pilot of Wash’s calibre would make easy work of it. “How long were we there,” he whispered a time later.
Jayne noted the hard set to River’s face as she answered Wash’s question. “Five weeks, three days, twenty-two hours, thirty-seven minutes and sixteen seconds.”
For once the crazy girl’s attention to detail was not scorned. Each of them in that shuttle would remember, to the second, what she had just said. Somehow it was not enough that they’d reduced every perpetrator of the crimes against them to particles floating in the Black. Every instant of the time that had ceased to hold meaning for them had suddenly become very important.
“Serenity?” whispered Zoë, giving voice to the question that had terrified Jayne. Why had Mal not come for them? Jayne Cobb, not a man given to fear or attachment, had felt lost and abandoned.
“Serenity is broken. We will make her whole.”
Zoë nodded. The girl’s answer didn’t tell them much, but it held hope. Hope that Jayne was too terrified to feel and yet with every link of his armour in shreds, he could not block the traitorous emotion.
~ : ~ : ~
“What… happened?” Mal asked with little hope of a coherent answer.
A gentle nudge from the doctor was all it took to get him sitting again. Recovering from the gut shot and broken arm that Niska’s men had dealt him six weeks earlier and been a tough prospect. Made more difficult by the belief that his former employer had managed to capture and kill off half his crew. That they stood before him now, with his missing shuttle docked in its place, was hardly settling. They were naked, bedraggled and in River’s case, bloody.
“River,” came Simon’s calm doctoring voice, “is any of that blood yours?”
The vacant stare of River’s eyes was a normalcy for her. That the other three had stares to match was disturbing his calm. Though the doctor spoke in a low, soothing voice, it was apparent his calm was a bit lacking as well.
“No injuries, Simon. At least, none that you can cure. You can help by unloading the shuttle, though. We’ve brought a cargo. All in all, a successful run, I’d say.” As though she weren’t stark naked and smeared with the evidence of a gruesome battle, River made her way past Mal and Simon into the ship. “I’ll be in the shower,” she called over her shoulder.
“I’ll be in my bunk,” Jayne muttered as he made his way after her.
“I’ll be taking the next shower,” said Zoë. “Don’t be worrying about that cargo, Doc. Jayne and I can handle it after we’ve rested some.” Mal watched as his first mate strode after the other two.
Only Wash was left, and he was the first to meet his eyes. “Don’t, Mal,” he said gently.
“Don’t what?” asked the Captain, feigning ignorance.
“Don’t push. Niska’s dead, along with anyone who cares. There’s a valuable cargo in the hold and we’re all back on the ship with no injuries to speak of. No one chasing after us either. Never had a job this successful, not wise to question it when good fortune swings your way.”
Wash gave a wry, weary smile, before following the others. Mal turned his attention to Simon only to find that the doctor had one of those thoughtful expressions that didn’t bode well.
Simon shrugged. “They might as well have all been fully dressed. They didn’t seem to register our surprise at finding them naked. They were all so - comfortable with it,” he said at last.
“I noticed that my own self,” replied Mal.
“I suppose I need to ask them if any of them have been raped.”
Mal shuddered. It didn’t matter that the same thought had been crossing his mind, for Simon to have said it out loud made it all too real a possibility. “We can’t put anything past Niska,” he murmured.
“I know. Remember who patched up the crew the last time.”
Mal nodded. “Those folk in Paradiso - think they were worth all this?”
Simon shook his head, obviously a little surprised and a lot uncomfortable with seeing his Captain question himself. “Never stopped you before,” was all he said as he wandered up to the infirmary.
“No, it never did,” muttered Mal to himself.
~ : ~ : ~
“This has been the state of my existence since the Captain first released me from cryo.”
Jayne glared at the girl who was taking up space in the corner of the hold. He didn’t want her understanding - he didn’t want to suddenly understand her. He was only wearing a pair of shorts, as he’d been lifting weights and had removed his shirt to wipe the sweat from his face. He didn’t like that he felt no discomfort at being bare in her presence. He didn’t like that her presence was comforting. Didn’t like that she was right. He, Zoë and Wash all knew now what it was like to be broken.
“Two halves of a whole, separate yet together. He’s taking us to Haven so that Book might marry the pieces together. Do I scare you, Jayne Cobb?”
He shook his head. “No,” he answered.
She smiled. “I used to terrify you. But now we are alike and you understand. Wash and Zoë have one another. They each meet the needs of the other and are complete in and of themselves. The others adapt to them because they don’t have unfulfilled needs - but you and I are different. They fear us because our wounds are raw and gaping and will not heal. They cannot fix us, so they fear us.”
“Wash and Zoë understand,” he whispered, not wanting to hear anymore of her nonsense.
She shook her head sadly. “They can’t heal us either. There is nothing left for it but to heal ourselves.”
“An’ how exactly do we do that, moonbrain?” he asked wearily.
She shrugged and began to unbutton her dress. He watched as the gauzy fabric slipped off her shoulders into a puddle at her feet. Nude, she stepped towards his waiting hands. “You do not fear me. Touch me.”
He complied, setting his hands on her hips and drawing her down atop him. Her lips immediately devoured his and he could taste the urgency of her desire - it matched his own. He pushed her over onto the overlarge crate upon which he’d been perched, turning with her so that he was leveraged over her and pulled his lips from hers. He felt the sting of her nails digging into his shoulders as he dragged his tongue down the salty flesh of her neck to the valley between her breasts. The smooth skin was a balm to his calloused hands as he kneaded her flesh and took her nipples deep into his mouth.
Her mewling cries broke through the silence that had encased his consciousness. He groaned loudly in response and revelled in the sound of it - the sound of them.
Driven by the need to feel - the need to experience - Jayne grazed his teeth against the soft flesh of her stomach, dipped his tongue into her navel, and slid lower still to inhale the scent of her. He breathed in deeply - sweet without being perfumed. Enticed he slid his tongue along her cleft. She shuddered and moaned. Grinning, he spread her open, sliding his thumbs against the soft slick flesh, driving her into a frenzy with his touch even as he lowered his head to kiss her more intimately.
So cold. He’d been so cold. Isolated from touch and sound - not caring to taste the peaches that had been purchased at their last stop - he’d only eaten more protein, and then only enough to subsist. Silence, he’d been drowning in it. And now he was waking up to all five of his senses. The smell of sex and sweat and woman, filled him. The flavour of her, her shrill screams, the feel of her soft skin and slick centre. When he pulled away from her to lower his shorts he was brought low by the sight of her. She lay spread before him; eyes half open, chest heaving, skin flushed, wet and ready for him - an offering to his need.
Jayne fell forward and bracing most of his weight on his forearms, he pushed slowly and inexorably forward. He almost hesitated when she cried out in pain, but her eyes flew open. “Do not fear me,” she ground out and he understood: there was no unwelcome sensation. To actually feel pain was as exhilarating as the pleasure. Jayne lost all conscious thought in that moment and gave himself over to the excruciating ecstasy of River’s body. She yelled out loudly as the crest of the wave pulled her under and she took him with her.
After several gasping moments, Jayne drew himself from her, but remained kneeling between her legs. He stared at the blood smeared across her thighs, blood that marked him. It bewildered him.
“You are proud,” she said softly and he raised his gaze to meet hers. “You drew blood with the thrust of your blade and thus have been the one to wound her and this pleases you.”
Her expression was one of interest, but he could not tell if she was upset with the swelling of pride within him or not. He found he did not care. She was right. In the same breath with which she’d screamed out in pain, she had begged him not to stop. Heedless of any consequence, he had planted seed within her and was the only man ever to do so. Yes. He was proud of himself. She had come with a force that had milked every drop from him. He had done that. He had made her feel those things that she had never felt before. The last shards of ice that divided him from himself shattered.
He narrowed his eyes into a calculating stare that he knew she could easily read. It did not matter. He would have her know his intentions. This would not end here - there would be more. He had marked her as his and he was not finished with her yet.
She smiled broadly. “Yes. I please you. You are not frightened by me and intend to dominate me. And I will subject myself. I will feel everything because you will hold nothing back.”
He knew his grin to be feral, and he didn’t care. She was his; willingly and completely his. No amount of coin could pay for this commodity and thus its value was beyond measure. She had given herself to him and he would take it.
~ : ~ : ~
Mal paced the walkway between the bunks. He was furious and the only thing that kept him from yanking open the door to Jayne’s bunk and pulling River away from him was the silent presence of his first mate. Zoë leaned against the wall with her arms folded over her chest, and watched him. Her eyes flashed menacingly whenever his hand reached for the handle on Jayne’s door. The two of them had staggered up from the hold and disappeared into Jayne’s bunk more than three hours earlier.
Zoë finally broke the silence with, “You don’t understand, sir.”
“Then make me!” shouted Mal. He was gorramn tired of all this nonsense. He wasn’t a man that held with idle chatter, but the unnatural silence of half his crew was a mite creepifying. “What happened?” he asked in a more moderate tone.
“You remember that ambush where we walked in with 80 men and walked out with seven?”
Mal felt the blood drain from his face at the remembered horror. “We don’t talk about that,” he whispered.
“Precisely,” replied Zoë.
The tension seeped out of him and Mal sagged, leaning against the wall for support. He’d never felt so helpless. His crew had a right to their grief and a right to cope however they thought best. And he was helpless to give them any comfort. Could not even comfort himself with any fine sense of revenge as Niska and all his men had been obliterated.
“There’s some as shouldn’t breathe the precious air in this verse. We come across another employer like that, we kill him outright and then take his money.”
Zoë nodded. “Yes, sir.”
~ fin ~
Author Index
This is for Dyce, who demanded some Rayne smut reciprocity :-D
Title: The Silent Place Beyond Pride
Firefly; Rayne; Adult: Graphic Sexual Situations; Not BDM compliant; 2100 words
Summary: Four of their number are taken and presumed dead. Escape was the easy part.
Disclaimer: Not mine. Joss is the creator of the characters and the ‘verse and the creative genius that inspires me to write. I’m only playing with the toys in his sandbox until he gets back and kicks me out.
Note 1: This is a little off centre for me and maybe a little dark and squicky. In any case, this isn’t fluff and the situations contained within might be disturbing to some. I’m not offended if you skip this one.
Note 2: This is in response to crazywriterchic’s Evil Challenge. My theme is Pride and I believe I have included all of the five senses and the fic takes place someplace other than one of their bunks.
Note 3: Many thanks to Ceslas for taking the time to beta this for me. I have edited this story and added to it in response to her insightful comments.
Jayne looked down at his arms and legs - not a scratch. Not even a bruise, much less any bullet holes. He was, in point of fact, a picture of health. Skin stretched taught over muscles honed to perfection. And yet, lying on Death’s door would be preferable to this. Caged naked in an empty glass box, he was on display for anyone who cared to walk by and take a glance.
They were lined up in glass cells, him, the moonbrain, Zoë and Wash, with corridors on either side. All of them naked, and all of them alone. Inara, Kaylee and the doc, led by Mal, were their only hope - and Jayne didn’t consider that to be much hope. He didn’t even know if they’d escaped capture or death. He didn’t know anything except that Niska was saving him and the three members of Serenity he could see, to torture later.
They were waiting for a painful death. Waiting without anything to comfort them - not even their pride.
Who knew how long they waited. Days? Weeks? Months? The lights were always on and there was no pattern to the delivery of food or the cleaning of waste. They were in a timeless state, like mice in a freezer waiting to be fed to a snake. And yet the moment did arrive when the first of them was taken. River, in the middle of a dance to music only she could hear, was taken from her cell. Jayne watched as she went docilely along with the ever-silent guards. A look back at the others showed a stoic and pinched lipped Zoë and a weeping Wash. Jayne just pounded his fists ineffectually against the glass.
If he had bothered trying to keep time, he would have known that it was only 20 minutes - but apathy to the passage of time had set in long ago. But still, he knew it hadn’t been that long when River returned to them. Bloody, but it was not her blood. Naked, but in full possession of her pride. Jayne watched her, in awe of her, as she opened first Wash’s cell, then Zoë’s and finally Jayne’s.
Silently - words had fallen into disuse - they followed her through a maze of corridors and bodies whose lives had ended abruptly to a docking bay where their shuttle remained unused. She pointed to a pile of crates and Jayne and Zoë obeyed her directive and began to load them onto the shuttle. Wouldn’t do to return to Serenity without a decent cargo, after all. Poor payment for what they’d suffered, but they took the goods all the same.
Wash was already at the controls, assessing the readiness of the shuttle for take off. Jayne topped off the cargo with as many fuel cells as he could find and the ship would hold while Zoë dug through the lockers for rations. River was lining the remaining fuel cells up and linking them to the power source. If she did it right, and River always did it right, the entire station would blow not long after they left.
The four of them crowded into the tiny cockpit, not caring if their naked bodies touched. They stared through the window at the fiery blast of Niska’s space station. The flames quickly extinguished in the vacuum of space and soon there was nothing left of Niska or his grisly crew but fine debris. They hovered for a moment as no one had mentioned a destination and River finally broke the silence. “Persephone,” she murmured.
Wash nodded. It was a stretch for a simple shuttle, but they’d piled on plenty of fuel cells. A pilot of Wash’s calibre would make easy work of it. “How long were we there,” he whispered a time later.
Jayne noted the hard set to River’s face as she answered Wash’s question. “Five weeks, three days, twenty-two hours, thirty-seven minutes and sixteen seconds.”
For once the crazy girl’s attention to detail was not scorned. Each of them in that shuttle would remember, to the second, what she had just said. Somehow it was not enough that they’d reduced every perpetrator of the crimes against them to particles floating in the Black. Every instant of the time that had ceased to hold meaning for them had suddenly become very important.
“Serenity?” whispered Zoë, giving voice to the question that had terrified Jayne. Why had Mal not come for them? Jayne Cobb, not a man given to fear or attachment, had felt lost and abandoned.
“Serenity is broken. We will make her whole.”
Zoë nodded. The girl’s answer didn’t tell them much, but it held hope. Hope that Jayne was too terrified to feel and yet with every link of his armour in shreds, he could not block the traitorous emotion.
~ : ~ : ~
“What… happened?” Mal asked with little hope of a coherent answer.
A gentle nudge from the doctor was all it took to get him sitting again. Recovering from the gut shot and broken arm that Niska’s men had dealt him six weeks earlier and been a tough prospect. Made more difficult by the belief that his former employer had managed to capture and kill off half his crew. That they stood before him now, with his missing shuttle docked in its place, was hardly settling. They were naked, bedraggled and in River’s case, bloody.
“River,” came Simon’s calm doctoring voice, “is any of that blood yours?”
The vacant stare of River’s eyes was a normalcy for her. That the other three had stares to match was disturbing his calm. Though the doctor spoke in a low, soothing voice, it was apparent his calm was a bit lacking as well.
“No injuries, Simon. At least, none that you can cure. You can help by unloading the shuttle, though. We’ve brought a cargo. All in all, a successful run, I’d say.” As though she weren’t stark naked and smeared with the evidence of a gruesome battle, River made her way past Mal and Simon into the ship. “I’ll be in the shower,” she called over her shoulder.
“I’ll be in my bunk,” Jayne muttered as he made his way after her.
“I’ll be taking the next shower,” said Zoë. “Don’t be worrying about that cargo, Doc. Jayne and I can handle it after we’ve rested some.” Mal watched as his first mate strode after the other two.
Only Wash was left, and he was the first to meet his eyes. “Don’t, Mal,” he said gently.
“Don’t what?” asked the Captain, feigning ignorance.
“Don’t push. Niska’s dead, along with anyone who cares. There’s a valuable cargo in the hold and we’re all back on the ship with no injuries to speak of. No one chasing after us either. Never had a job this successful, not wise to question it when good fortune swings your way.”
Wash gave a wry, weary smile, before following the others. Mal turned his attention to Simon only to find that the doctor had one of those thoughtful expressions that didn’t bode well.
Simon shrugged. “They might as well have all been fully dressed. They didn’t seem to register our surprise at finding them naked. They were all so - comfortable with it,” he said at last.
“I noticed that my own self,” replied Mal.
“I suppose I need to ask them if any of them have been raped.”
Mal shuddered. It didn’t matter that the same thought had been crossing his mind, for Simon to have said it out loud made it all too real a possibility. “We can’t put anything past Niska,” he murmured.
“I know. Remember who patched up the crew the last time.”
Mal nodded. “Those folk in Paradiso - think they were worth all this?”
Simon shook his head, obviously a little surprised and a lot uncomfortable with seeing his Captain question himself. “Never stopped you before,” was all he said as he wandered up to the infirmary.
“No, it never did,” muttered Mal to himself.
~ : ~ : ~
“This has been the state of my existence since the Captain first released me from cryo.”
Jayne glared at the girl who was taking up space in the corner of the hold. He didn’t want her understanding - he didn’t want to suddenly understand her. He was only wearing a pair of shorts, as he’d been lifting weights and had removed his shirt to wipe the sweat from his face. He didn’t like that he felt no discomfort at being bare in her presence. He didn’t like that her presence was comforting. Didn’t like that she was right. He, Zoë and Wash all knew now what it was like to be broken.
“Two halves of a whole, separate yet together. He’s taking us to Haven so that Book might marry the pieces together. Do I scare you, Jayne Cobb?”
He shook his head. “No,” he answered.
She smiled. “I used to terrify you. But now we are alike and you understand. Wash and Zoë have one another. They each meet the needs of the other and are complete in and of themselves. The others adapt to them because they don’t have unfulfilled needs - but you and I are different. They fear us because our wounds are raw and gaping and will not heal. They cannot fix us, so they fear us.”
“Wash and Zoë understand,” he whispered, not wanting to hear anymore of her nonsense.
She shook her head sadly. “They can’t heal us either. There is nothing left for it but to heal ourselves.”
“An’ how exactly do we do that, moonbrain?” he asked wearily.
She shrugged and began to unbutton her dress. He watched as the gauzy fabric slipped off her shoulders into a puddle at her feet. Nude, she stepped towards his waiting hands. “You do not fear me. Touch me.”
He complied, setting his hands on her hips and drawing her down atop him. Her lips immediately devoured his and he could taste the urgency of her desire - it matched his own. He pushed her over onto the overlarge crate upon which he’d been perched, turning with her so that he was leveraged over her and pulled his lips from hers. He felt the sting of her nails digging into his shoulders as he dragged his tongue down the salty flesh of her neck to the valley between her breasts. The smooth skin was a balm to his calloused hands as he kneaded her flesh and took her nipples deep into his mouth.
Her mewling cries broke through the silence that had encased his consciousness. He groaned loudly in response and revelled in the sound of it - the sound of them.
Driven by the need to feel - the need to experience - Jayne grazed his teeth against the soft flesh of her stomach, dipped his tongue into her navel, and slid lower still to inhale the scent of her. He breathed in deeply - sweet without being perfumed. Enticed he slid his tongue along her cleft. She shuddered and moaned. Grinning, he spread her open, sliding his thumbs against the soft slick flesh, driving her into a frenzy with his touch even as he lowered his head to kiss her more intimately.
So cold. He’d been so cold. Isolated from touch and sound - not caring to taste the peaches that had been purchased at their last stop - he’d only eaten more protein, and then only enough to subsist. Silence, he’d been drowning in it. And now he was waking up to all five of his senses. The smell of sex and sweat and woman, filled him. The flavour of her, her shrill screams, the feel of her soft skin and slick centre. When he pulled away from her to lower his shorts he was brought low by the sight of her. She lay spread before him; eyes half open, chest heaving, skin flushed, wet and ready for him - an offering to his need.
Jayne fell forward and bracing most of his weight on his forearms, he pushed slowly and inexorably forward. He almost hesitated when she cried out in pain, but her eyes flew open. “Do not fear me,” she ground out and he understood: there was no unwelcome sensation. To actually feel pain was as exhilarating as the pleasure. Jayne lost all conscious thought in that moment and gave himself over to the excruciating ecstasy of River’s body. She yelled out loudly as the crest of the wave pulled her under and she took him with her.
After several gasping moments, Jayne drew himself from her, but remained kneeling between her legs. He stared at the blood smeared across her thighs, blood that marked him. It bewildered him.
“You are proud,” she said softly and he raised his gaze to meet hers. “You drew blood with the thrust of your blade and thus have been the one to wound her and this pleases you.”
Her expression was one of interest, but he could not tell if she was upset with the swelling of pride within him or not. He found he did not care. She was right. In the same breath with which she’d screamed out in pain, she had begged him not to stop. Heedless of any consequence, he had planted seed within her and was the only man ever to do so. Yes. He was proud of himself. She had come with a force that had milked every drop from him. He had done that. He had made her feel those things that she had never felt before. The last shards of ice that divided him from himself shattered.
He narrowed his eyes into a calculating stare that he knew she could easily read. It did not matter. He would have her know his intentions. This would not end here - there would be more. He had marked her as his and he was not finished with her yet.
She smiled broadly. “Yes. I please you. You are not frightened by me and intend to dominate me. And I will subject myself. I will feel everything because you will hold nothing back.”
He knew his grin to be feral, and he didn’t care. She was his; willingly and completely his. No amount of coin could pay for this commodity and thus its value was beyond measure. She had given herself to him and he would take it.
~ : ~ : ~
Mal paced the walkway between the bunks. He was furious and the only thing that kept him from yanking open the door to Jayne’s bunk and pulling River away from him was the silent presence of his first mate. Zoë leaned against the wall with her arms folded over her chest, and watched him. Her eyes flashed menacingly whenever his hand reached for the handle on Jayne’s door. The two of them had staggered up from the hold and disappeared into Jayne’s bunk more than three hours earlier.
Zoë finally broke the silence with, “You don’t understand, sir.”
“Then make me!” shouted Mal. He was gorramn tired of all this nonsense. He wasn’t a man that held with idle chatter, but the unnatural silence of half his crew was a mite creepifying. “What happened?” he asked in a more moderate tone.
“You remember that ambush where we walked in with 80 men and walked out with seven?”
Mal felt the blood drain from his face at the remembered horror. “We don’t talk about that,” he whispered.
“Precisely,” replied Zoë.
The tension seeped out of him and Mal sagged, leaning against the wall for support. He’d never felt so helpless. His crew had a right to their grief and a right to cope however they thought best. And he was helpless to give them any comfort. Could not even comfort himself with any fine sense of revenge as Niska and all his men had been obliterated.
“There’s some as shouldn’t breathe the precious air in this verse. We come across another employer like that, we kill him outright and then take his money.”
Zoë nodded. “Yes, sir.”
~ fin ~
Author Index