The Return Home – Part 8

Serenity sat in a dry river bed on Oxbridge moon in the outer edges of the Persephone system, a necessary stop to make repairs to the ship due to damage caused in a battle with two Alliance gunships a few hours earlier. After a quick lunch Kaylee got to work patching holes and making the ship air tight again, at least for the time being. As she hung over the side of Inara’s shuttle in a harness, with soldering metal and torch in hand, Kaylee knew it was only a rough patch job and that they would have to land on Hera and go into that shipyard Badger said was there, close by Serenity Valley. The shock his words produced was evident on the Capt’n and Zoe’s faces. Serenity Valley. The last battle.

Badger explained that a cousin of his had a shipyard nearby the battlefield. He had set up shop there years ago after the battle, scavenging metal and tank and high flyer parts from the battlefield, making a tidy profit and then was able to open his own ship repair yard. Mal made no decisions on whether they would go or not and left the table in a foul mood. Kaylee asked Jayne to help her with the repairs and the big merc was glad to get off the boat, and away from the questions he knew everyone except River had about Book’s letter.

They moved about the ship for hours, attached to EVA lines and harnesses, pounding out dents with mallets, pulling spent Alliance heavy slugs from the hull, soldering holes in the back and in Inara’s shuttle. Kaylee’s rad detector signaled that they were leaking rads somewhere from the tail end and she got the feeling that the full burn in atmo they executed to escape the Alliance gunships had caused the ship to overstress itself. There had to be a small hairline crack in the bibulous end but Kaylee couldn’t see, didn’t have the equipment to detect it or repair it and knew it had to be fixed before it caused bigger problems. She patched all the holes she could find in Inara’s shuttle and then Jayne pulled her up to the top of the shuttle and they climbed to the