Author's Note: I had this piece all planned out, but was debating whether to actually write it. Then, I picked up a copy of Serenity: The Official Visual Companion, in which Joss, in an interview, is asked about ‘certain shocking events’ toward the end of the movie. He says that a) it was never his intent to leave any man or woman behind, b) it’s possible that all crew members could return, if there is a sequel and that c) no magic amulets are allowed. Well, if he’s going to leave that window unlocked, I’m going to throw it wide open. All movie events are intact. And yet, all is not as it seemed . . .

1. Inevitable Betrayal

After Miranda

There was nowhere among the living that Serenity could go.

All of her safe harbors were destroyed. None of her business contacts would touch her, unless to turn her in; she was too hot. In the wake of the Miranda broadwave, it wasn’t just the Tams whose faces papered the Cortex from Ariel to Whitefall, it was all of them: Mal and Zoe, Kaylee and Jayne. Everyone except Inara, who through the power of her Companion registration or some inexplicable oversight by the Operative, was not listed among Serenity’s crew.

Unable to walk among the living, Serenity went to the dead.

**

Every single dock that protruded from the Sanchez brothers’ orbital repair facility had been destroyed by the Alliance. So Serenity hung in space outside the wrecked space station, and her crew suited up in the cargo bay, preparing to cross through the black.

“Kaylee, you and Jayne are after fuel cells and engine parts,” Mal said, standing with his suit helmet hanging from his right hand. “Anything we might need now or later; anything we might be able to use. We’re the first ones here because we were the first to know, but that won’t be true later, so we have to get what we can get now.”

Kaylee nodded bleakly.

“Simon, Inara -- medical supplies and commissary. Again, anything we might could use, now or l