Disclaimer – Everything either does belong to Joss or it should. I’m just borrowing his shiny ‘verse for a while.

The 21st Lancers belong to the British Army so I’m borrowing them too. I hope they don’t mind.

Thanks to my regular readers for making it worthwhile to continue the story and special thanks to my Proof-Reader terribletink

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AI Warship Shadow Grounded – Revelation – 2520AD

Mal pounded on the side of the ship before sticking his head inside. Kaylee turned to greet him, but before she could, a voice boomed from the nearest loud-speaker.

‘It’s even worse than it looks,’ Shadow stated flatly. In Revelation’s thin atmosphere the AI sounded wistful, maybe even a touch melancholy. Hell, maybe it was melancholy -- it was self-aware, and the things were prone to certain mental complaints just like humans.

‘Can you fix it little Kaylee?’ Mal asked.

‘I’ll never be the same again,’ the AI moaned.

‘Shadow, shut the hell up,’ Mal ordered.

Kaylee pointed to a hole melted in the ship’s hull. ‘I can patch him easily enough, but not with anything anywhere near as good as the rest of his hull. Its super-shiny stuff must have cost a fortune.’

‘What about other systems?’

‘Main power linkages to the weapons were cooked, but that just means I’ll have to rip out the cables and put in replacements. There’s cable we can scavenge that should be thick enough to handle the load in the Reaver ships.’

‘What about the reactor?’

Kaylee took a deep breath. ‘It needs a major overhaul. It’ll work, but if too much strain is put on, it might fail. Perhaps catastrophically. Some of the parts got so hot they warped with the heat. I might even have to panel-beat the casing.’

A thought crossed Mal’s mind. ‘How’s the radiation?’ he asked, suddenly concerned for the integrity of Kaylee’s DNA if she was going to be here a while.

‘If Shadow was crewed it would have killed everyone aboard. As it is, the engine room is a bit hot and always will be. Not overly dangerous, just