The Return Home - Part 10

Mal and the crew were sure in a pickle this time. They had just landed on Miranda after eluding the nearby Reaver space fleet, found the mysterious Professor Stanley Drummond, camped out in what appeared to a prison compound, and now the man said he had no intentions of leaving because he was looking for a ‘cure” for the Reavers.

“There ain’t no gorramn cure for them Reavers,” Jayne said as warily eyed the dead Reaver bodies in the courtyard like area Serenity was now parked in. Jayne kept Vera up and ready at his side, not trusting no Reavers, dead or alive.

“On the contrary, Mr…Cobb?” Professor Drummond replied as he smoked his cigar. “The Reavers are human like you and I and they are the result of a dastardly plot perpetrated against the people of this planet.”

“So it’s true,” said Zoe. “The Reavers are the result of some chemical warfare experiment gone wrong?”

“It could never have gone right,” Drummond said sadly. “I tried to warn them but the fools wouldn’t listen.”

“Yeah, that’s all fine and dandy Professor,” Mal said quickly, wanting to get to the point as soon as possible. “But me and my crew ain’t sticking around here while you play scientist and try to find a cure. We got your broadcast, came here to get you out, and that’s the plan.”

“Then by all means leave,” said Drummond, staring Mal straight in the face.

Mal just shook his head. “What’s with you intellectual types? Don’t you know there’s whole mess of Reavers out there in space looking to make you and us a banquet?”

“Of course Captain, I know. But they are my neighbors, and friends and….family. I can’t leave. Not yet.”

“Family?” Zoe said with a touch of anger. “Seems like you killed a lot of your ‘family’.”

The Professor looked about the courtyard at the dead bodies, one even crushed under one of Serenity’s landing legs, and shook his head as if he made a serious error. “Regrettable, but necessary. But they are not to blame for their actions. It was the chemicals that made them what they