Disclaimer: Joss, Fox, Universal Own ’em. (Except for Allan and the kids. they're mine) I’m just playing. No money being made.

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This story takes place nine years after Serenity (BDM) and has the established couples of Simon/Kaylee, Mal/Inara, Zoë/Allan and Jayne/River. Takes place five years post “The Bash”

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Thanks again to Woonsocket and Chris for the Beta work

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Relics

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Chapter Thirteen

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“What do you think, Kaylee?”

“You're right. Someone killed these poor folks,” the mechanic said sadly as she absently kicked a chunk of burned and twisted metal.

Allan nodded in agreement. He and Kaylee had spent most of the previous day collecting as many pieces of the obliterated engine pod as they could find. Pieces had been thrown hundreds of yards by the blast. One particularly large chunk had actually put a dent in Serenity's own hull.

Working from the fragmented components, the pair then arranged them in the rough outline of a pod, which looked vaguely like a huge 3D jigsaw puzzle. As they worked, a few of the local townspeople showed up with additional pieces of wreckage flung far away from the scene.

Allan scanned every part laid out on the ground with a hand held scanner. The small device was able to look for trace gases and other by-products. Normally carried on Serenity for calibrating the life support system, it worked well for forensic work too.

It was late in the second day of their 'investigation' that they found what they were looking for.

It was a part that Sara and Becca had proudly dragged from the shrubbery. The two girls had wanted to help. So, with stern warnings about what and what not to touch, the girls gleefully set off into the underbrush looking for metal fragments.

What they had found was a large piece of the fusion initiator assembly that had embedded itself into the hard soil of Deadwood.

The two parents had chuckled at first when they heard the grunts that the five and six-year olds made dragging the chunk of twisted machinery. The p