On the tenth day of Christmas my true love gave to me ten lords a-leaping

The crew sat in the booth, silently watching the replay of the day before. They for sure had not recovered from seeing Kaylee manhandled as she had been, or from Jayne’s display of killing fury.

The violence against Kaylee had affected them all. Zoë and the shepherd had gone all tight-lipped. The captain could hear Wash swearing over the Cortex and feel Simon’s silence. River was standing poised for action looking, for once, like the dangerous weapon she was. He had grasped hold of the girl’s arm to contain her and perhaps himself had felt her relax slightly just before Jayne had cut loose with a machine gun.

When the man had opened fire like that, the captain thought that Jayne had finally snapped.

But no, the machine gun had systematically swept the area cutting down first the guards and then the watchers. It wasn’t till the machine gun was empty that anyone had seen him. Jayne had burst from the bushes on the hillside dropping the machine gun and grabbing another weapon shooting on the run at the men surrounding Kaylee. When he ran out of bullets, Jayne had drawn his knife and slashed his way through anyone who prevented him from getting to the mechanic who was doing her best to help him achieve his goal.

The whole time the little mechanic was in the hands of the hun dans she had fought and fought. Several times she had nearly given them the slip causing them to get more violent with her. But she had never given up. The moment Jayne started shooting Kaylee had dropped to the ground and started crawling away heading toward the open ground. She had dodged and ducked till she arrived at the very edge of the clearing at the same time as Jayne who kept firing the whole way. It was Kaylee who had bent down and collected weapons as they ran.

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They had run and run. Jayne had had to get them away from there, quick as possible. Other hunters could’ve heard the shots, be on them like fleas on a dog