Title: The Alliance Spins, Part 3 of 6

Author: CharlieBZ

Summary: Mal needs coin.

Rating: PG for language

Characters: Crew

Pairings: Canon, if any

Spoilers/Timeline: post battle on Mr. U’s moon but before the end of the BDM

Disclaimer: No money is being made from this by me and I certainly don’t own Firefly/Serenity.

Author's Note: This fic takes place within my FicVerse. If you’re a little lost see my blog entry

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The Alliance Spins, Part 3

Walking out of Harvey’s Shiny RepairYards , Mal paused outside the gate surprised at the sight before him. In the four years since he had left here, Marseilles New had experienced great changes. Before the war, Hera’s Xiang Kao served as the main hub for commercial trade from the Core to the border planets. The war, however, left that city in ruins. Seeing an opportunity to recoup fortunes lost in the war, several influential Persephone families pooled what resources they had left and successfully persuaded key Alliance bureaucrats of the advantage of giving Marseilles New preferential status. In the seven years since the war ended, Marseilles New saw its population quadruple as commercial trade gradually approached pre-war levels.

Such was his aversion to this city that Mal had diligently avoided the entire eastern hemisphere of Persephone in an attempt to keep his distance from it. Of course, being the enterprising crook that he was, he’d kept up with the happenings about town so he was aware that the major commercial trade routes had now been diverted here. Still, he was unprepared for the extent of MarNew’s transformation in such a short time.

Mal, Inara, and Kaylee set off on their shopping excursion. Kaylee figured it was che