The Trial of Jayne

Jayne turned on the light in the inky blackness of the hidden compartment. He could hear River Tam’s slow, rhythmic breathing beside him. The light seemed inordinately bright after the long darkness and Jayne squinted. In the very back of the compartment was the large crate with the money and next to it lie River. So far the crews searching the ship had not discovered their hiding place. Never in his life did Jayne expect to hide himself here. Strewn around the floor was a pillow, some blankets, some water containers and various canned and packaged goods Jayne planned to take with him on his big getaway. Though he’d contacted the people who hired Serenity and told them what happened, Jayne’s natural mistrust of people made him back out of making contact with them. So, like the cautious man he was, Jayne Cobb decided to hide and make a break for it later.

Everything was going as planned when River passed out. Jayne knew then that something was going wrong. He heard the search teams board the ship and carry off the crew. That was about 12 hours ago near as he could tell. At the moment he was beginning to worry about River and wondering if he weren’t sharing a tight space with a dead body.

Presently the hull shuddered and metallic sounds could be heard filling the ship. They were the sounds of a ship being towed. Jayne set his jaw and strained to listen. There were no sounds in the cargo bay. This was all going south fast.

Malcolm sat in the conference room again only this time there was no relaxed air about him. Tension could be tasted like old canned rations. Malcolm starred at Okeida, then at the two men at the ready. Okeida was reading some papers showing no emotion.

Malcolm could take it no longer, “I appreciate the heap of hospitality you’ve shown us all, but I need to know what you figurin’ on doing with us. You gonna turn us over to the Alliance?”

The small man smiled, “Captain Reynolds, I could have turned you over to the Alliance at any point. Threatening you with autho