Damaged Goods: Part 1a Rehashed

Prologue:

Mal and the crew of Serenity find themselves on a return trip back towards the core planets. Their latest mission completed, the payment, although beneficial to Serenity, wasn’t so enjoyable as paying jobs go. They had delivered furniture to an old family acquaintance of Kaylee’s. Not that Mal saw anything wrong in doing this, but there was no exchange of coin or hard currency in the deal. It was more of a bartered application. Furniture for engine parts. Mal really disliked not getting paid…..but after what had happened with the engine catalyzer not so long ago, he had decided that if his mechanic needed a part for Serenity, then he’d better listen. That was the trade-off, but unknown to her crew at the moment, there was much more in store for Serenity during this voyage, much more….

Damaged Goods: Part 1

Malcolm Reynolds climbed down the structure to his bunk in the area of Serenity’s crew hall. Grabbing the suspenders of his daywear he began to undress until he noticed a small Babushka doll sitting on the desk of his wave monitor. He stopped and walked over to the simple play-thing.

He uncorked the doll, but instead of there being another, smaller doll inside he found a piece of paper with writing. He opened it up and read the note……..

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Twenty-four minutes later; Ship’s galley:

“ Come on Mal it’s been over thirty days since we had a decent payin’ job. Least we could do is check out Badger’s latest wave and decide if runnin insect cadavers over to the “School of Arachnid Studies” on Osirus would be worth our while,” Serenity’s resident mercenary Jayne Cobb was saying as he sat in a galley chair by the crew table.

“ No Jayne! Hauling dead bugs around the verse would be better left to the kind of folk who enjoy transporting weaving materials, or helium balloons to those who value them out on the rim worlds. We ain’t gotten that desperate yet.”

“ We’ve been close,” Wash, the pilot of