Cold Sweat

The following is strictly recreationally generated fan fiction. All characters that are property of Mutant Enemy and Joss Whedon are theirs, anybody I made up is mine. Sin lucre ergo nullus litigium. (Okay that probably translates as “I’m broke, don’t sue.” but you get the idea.)

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The message had been brief but effective.

Serenity was going as fast as she could without the crew getting out and pushing, headed for what had come to feel like home.

They’d just gone out on a quick run to meet with a small delegation trying to convince him to join up for the imminent, they assured him, resurgence. The small woman had slipped him a note as they passed through the airlock into their own ship.

He hadn’t bothered to read it until he’d gotten to his bunk and they were underway, not that it would have mattered really. The slip of paper contained only one sentence, no signature.

“You have nothing except Freedom left to fight for.”

It had taken a moment to sink in, then he was running for the bridge shouting to River to head for home and get them there yesterday. The poor girl had actually started to try working out how to do it before he’d hit the copilot chair, clarified his order, and begun screaming at Kaylee over the com to crank the engines as far as they’d go.

That was a day and a half ago and there had been no reply to any of their waves. It did not bode well. Zoe was methodically cleaning and loading every weapon on board including the Cobb Collection. They’d left Simon behind to tell Jazmine where everyone had gone should she and Jayne return before the meeting was over. Kaylee was hovering somewhere between panic and gibbering with worry, but she was keeping the engines up and running even if it was taking every fire extinguisher on board.

They’d landed in bright sunlight in the farmyard back on Copia so hard they’d almost bounced. He told River to stay with the ship in case of trouble, then nearly been run over by Kaylee and Zoe as t