Chapter 1

Into the Box

The crew of the Serenity walked out of the cargo bay into the sunny, dusty marketplace on Persephone; except for Simon and River who were staying behind and out of site. Wash and Zoe were going to find a bath and quiet time alone. Mal was off to various different areas on ship errands. Book was off to the Abbey for tea with his fellow Shepards and to see if they had some vegetables to spare. Inara had left the ship in her shuttle prior to Serenity landing in Persephone on her way to a short engagement. And Jayne was off to find a drink and a woman, in that order.

As they all scattered their separate ways a small figure, of rather indeterminate age, watched from the shadows eyes narrowing in on Mal. A medium height man with a gun belt slung low across his hips. He looked like a good mark; the gun wasn’t too big of a deal. Everyone wore one if not two or three and he would never notice his money missing. Caroline squared her shoulders back and headed out from the alley mimicking his stride on the other side of him and generally making a little nuisance of herself; an amusing little nuisance. It was an act that she had perfected over the last couple of years; sometimes people gave her credits, other times she took them. At first Mal tried to ignore her; but, she wouldn’t let that happen. After five minutes of watching him laugh at her antics she pinched his wallet vanished into a convenient alley. Darting quickly from that alley into another alley she finally stopped and checked out the Ident Card and tried to sound out the name – M, Ma, Mal… something – reading wasn’t her strong suit. “Some fancy pants name” she thought to herself as she shoved everything inside her coat. “Maybe ma’s feeling good today;” it was nice when she was feeling good then if Caroline brought home wallets with Ident Cards they’d play a little game guessing about the lives of the people on the cards. If she was feeling really good they would go out for walk in the marketplace and buy fruit, real fru