Okay, this was a stupid idea, Mal thought to himself as he stood there with his hands up in the air.

Before him stood Patience, with two of her men holding guns on Mal, Zoë and Jayne. The old woman was smiling as her hands played with a blue glass bottle that she was carrying as she walked closer to where Malcolm Reynolds stood.

“Mal, my boy, you just ain’t too bright. Coming back here after what you did last time.”

“You mean leaving you the cargo as I took the cashy money you owed us?” Mal asked. Okay so I can’t help it, I am a smartass, Mal thought.

“I am talk’n bout how you shot my horse!” Patience said. “That there horse was my favorite animal.”

“Well I do rightly apologize, but if you’ll recall you were using ‘em fer cover.” Mal said.

“I have been planning this fer months Malcolm Reynolds. Took a lot of money to get this here stuff, but I figure it’ll be worth it.” Patience said. With that she hefted the bottle she held in her hands and threw it directly at Mal.

Mal didn’t know what was in the bottle but he weren’t going to find out. Instead he threw himself sideways drawing his gun as he fell and firing. Zoë moved at that moment as well taking out the other man with a blow from the butt of her Mare’s Leg.

A hoarse scream behind him made him remember that Jayne had been just behind him when the bottle had been thrown. Patience was laughing and Mal glared at her before turning his attention behind him to Jayne.

What he saw surprised the hell out of him.

Jayne wasn’t standing behind him, or at least it weren’t the Jayne he knew. Standing over a pile of Jayne’s clothes and his precious Vera was a huge black horse with big dinner plate sized hooves and a long dark mane that fell over its eyes.

Zoë was covering Patience but she too had seen what that blue bottle had done to Jayne. Knowing that the bottle had been meant for Mal, she cocked her gun prepared to kill the old woman on Mal’s word.

“What the hell was in that?” Mal stood and marched over to where Patience was