The Treasure of Lei Fong Wu

Chapter Fifty-Six

RESCUE TEAM –39:01

“You sure about this, Sir?” Zoe asked, eyebrows raised inquisitively. “Don’t much like the thought o’ you havin’ all the fun without me.” She held her shotgun casually, but in a way that Mal’s long acquaintance with her told him much. She was irritated at being relegated to what she clearly thought was menial duty, when in fact she was far more valuable as part of the assault team that would make a foray on the Engine Room – but that she would accept his judgment because it did make a kind of sense, she did want to see Wash, and she was, after all, at lower flight rank than him. She would also get back at him in some painful, personally humiliating way at some future point for this assignment.

Funny, he thought to himself, how a little thing like how a woman held her gun could communicate subtle nuances and distinctions like that.

“I don’t much like it either, but there you go,” Mal admitted, warily. “We got wounded. And there’s too much evil lurkin’ in the hallways to let them go back without some protection.” He looked around, but didn’t elaborate. The second White Tiger base was just as frightening as the first, in terms of slogans and debris, but bigger. There was also blood on the deck, and one Tiger corpse that seemed to have been shot execution style, a pistol to the back of the head. He wondered about the story behind that – a good one, no doubt. At least there was one less Tiger to contend with. Eight, actually, after their assault.

“Ain’t like they’re helpless,” Zoe said, her underlying tone a plea for another assignment. “Couple o’ commandos with ‘em. They’ll be fine!”

“They ain’t up to the stress and you know it,” Mal reproved. “You want them relying on a couple of broken up soldiers, a recently tortured preacher, and a couple o’ Companions? Oh, and Dead-Eye Tam, scourge of the spaceways. Zoe, you gotta go. Don’t trust no one else to make sure they get back to Serenity.”

“Yeah,” Zoe admitted re