Life Onboard Serenity: #40 - Burnt Stew, Dinner and a Job - Let's Celebrate!
POSTED BY: EnglishIvy
UPDATED: Tuesday, December 16, 2008 19:54
VIEWED: 23027
PAGE 4 of 11
Pain's Bunk
Quote:
Originally posted by EnglishIvy:
"I came here as a passenger, Pain. What's going to happen when I have to leave?"
Pain sighed in frustration. He hadn't thought of that.
If there was ever a thing in the 'Verse that Pain didn't want to hear, this was one of them. To Pain it felt as if he'd been kicked in the crotch by a donkey wearing steel-toed boots repeatedly on end without so much as a 'please' and 'thank you'.
There was a weight in his stomach that felt like it weighed a thousand pounds and a lump in his throat. Pain swallowed hard and asked, "Who says you have to leave, babe? Why can't you stay on Serenity with me?"
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WWJD: What Would Jayne Do?
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Quote:
Originally posted by DRPAIN:
"Who says you have to leave, babe? Why can't you stay on Serenity with me?"
Ivy looked up at him.
"I don't want to leave here. I don't want to leave you," she whispered. "If there was a way I could stay... If the Captain would let me... Anyway, I'd do it in a minute."
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Pain's Bunk
Quote:
Originally posted by EnglishIvy:
"I don't want to leave here. I don't want to leave you," she whispered. "If there was a way I could stay... If the Captain would let me... Anyway, I'd do it in a minute."
"Don't worry about the Captain, darlin'." Pain replied, the weight in his stomach fading away. "I'll deal with him when him and I have our little chat tomorrow."
He ran a hand through her hair, smiled and said, "Now lets think happy thoughts and get some sleep, alright?" He gave her a kiss, winked at her, and continued, "We have a busy day tomorrow and we need to be well rested for it."
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WWJD: What Would Jayne Do?
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Quote:
Originally posted by DRPAIN:
"Don't worry about the Captain, darlin'. I'll deal with him when him and I have our little chat tomorrow."
Ivy felt little butterflies twitter in her stomach. Could it be possible? Is there a way she might be able to stay on the ship? With Pain?
She said a silent prayer. She definitely didn't want to leave. She was right though. She'd do anything to stay.
She gave him a hopeful smile.
Quote:
Originally posted by DRPAIN:
"Now lets think happy thoughts and get some sleep, alright? We have a busy day tomorrow and we need to be well rested for it."
Busy day... Sleeping in, making breakfast, a shower... *her mind wandered a little at that thought* A check up with Simon...
Simon. A thought for a plant jumped into her head. It was perfect. She'd have to give it to him in the morning.
With a smile on her face, she slid her hand across Pain's stomach, pulled herself close to him and fell asleep.
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Isahiah reclined on the young mechanic's bed with his hands joined beneath his head, his fingers folded in a small hollow for his head to repose in. The bed was a short one, which required him to angle his knees upward to keep his feet from dangling over the edge of the mattress. He considered the room in silence. He was still unsure as to what class of vessel he was dealing with, though he was beginning to get a strong inkling, but he had a sense that it was the smallest on board.
Although,he thought.That might be imputable to a rather marginal approach to decoration. He glanced around him. Clothes hung from virtually anything fit to serve as a hook, a host of obscure publications whose titles he could not make out amidst the dim lighting issued by Kaylee's heart-shaped bedside lamp were piled in a precarious mound atop of a run-down wooden dresser, and torn foil wrappers were bestrewn over nearly every flat surface. A whole herd of plushes plus a pink bell dress, complete with a matching paper umbrella, rounded off the scene.
Not a room he would typically associate with an engineer. Its cluttered state suggested that it was seldom used, as if its occupant had other places she'd rather dwell in. A most unusual indulgence on a spacefaring craft, where space was typically held as paramount.
He leaned over to his side and flicked off the lamp, plunging the room into pitch-black darkness, then rolled onto his back and let himself be lulled to sleep by the drone of the ship's gravity drive.
His tranquility was disrupted when a sonorous clang echoing from the access shaft caused him to stir slightly. Then came the steady thud of someone climbing down the ladder bars, and suddenly he was wide awake again. Having nothing in the way of a weapon on hand, he switched the lamp back on and sat to face the intruder, hoping that mere wits would suffice to avoid a physical confrontation.
Quote:
Originally posted by JOHNTHETHEATERFREAK:
"Oh! Sorry," John said, "I was just looking for Kaylee. Why are you in here?"
Isahiah placed him instantly. John, the unassuming gent from the galley, who had been quick to voice his disgruntlement over his reticence to disclose information regarding the tasks ahead. Isahiah gauged the man charily. He was no stranger to hand-to-hand combat, but he was also keenly aware of just how deep a toll recent events had taken on his body. In his tired, withered state, he doubted he would prevail should things degenerate into a brawl. He would have to hope that they didn't slide down that path.
"I'm sleeping, or rather I was, before you roused me," he answered placidly. "Kaylee lent me her room for the night," he continued. "A vibrant young lady that one. Doctor Tam is a lucky man." He paused to observe his interlocutor, scouting for behavioral tip offs, strings and pulleys to tug at.
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BigWolf18 "Way i remember it, you said you was leavin', dare say that saved us a whole peck o' trouble. now i gotta wonder what could spur on a fine disreputable man like yourself to show your fine disreputable face here again."
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"She sure is," John replied glaring at the man. "I suppose while I'm here I have a question for you. This job you've got for us, how sure are you that it's going to involve trouble?"
johnttf
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Quote:
Originally posted by JOHNTHETHEATERFREAK:
She sure is," John replied glaring at the man. "I suppose while I'm here I have a question for you. This job you've got for us, how sure are you that it's going to involve trouble?"
Isahiah suppressed a scornful comeback, and took a moment of consideration before he worded a response.
"Quite," he finally said. "Should things go awry, there's a strong likelihood of one or several members of this crew, not to mention my own self, being injured or killed."
He cleared his throat in an effort to oust a handful of bread crumbs that had lodged themselves into his larynx.
"If I haven't been quite as forthright as you'd have wished, it's because I must, and no length of physical abuse will compel me to do otherwise. This goes beyond mere trust issues. There are things I simply cannot tell you, either because I'm not sure of the facts myself, or because doing so would be detrimental to the pursuit of my... objectives."
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BigWolf18 "Way i remember it, you said you was leavin', dare say that saved us a whole peck o' trouble. now i gotta wonder what could spur on a fine disreputable man like yourself to show your fine disreputable face here again."
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"You see that's not okay. I don't like it when my people get hurt. And if someone gets killed...I'm not even willing to discuss that. I don't care about your gorram "objectives." I'd just as soon throw you out the airlock as let this crew enter into a nasty situation without all the facts. So if you don't want to tell me, fine, but I will find out what you know. Trust me." John climbed out of the room and turned to the bridge. As he entered River gave him a look. "Invasion of privacy," she said.
"One of us dead," he responded. She was silent but then got up and went to the door to the man's bunk and began to probe his mind. "I'm not telling you, you know," she said.
"I know, just make sure it's not a huge death trap."
johnttf
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River crouched to her knees and laid her palms against the cold metal hatch, smiling fleetingly at the ludicrous ornaments Kaylee had incorporated to the doorframe, then closed her eyes and let her perceptions flow outward. She protracted a mental tendril so as to touch the mind of the man resting in the cabin below, and dove forth into his thoughts.
At first, all she saw were haphazard collections of sounds and images randomly pulled from his memory, glimpses of a past mingled with many feats and exploits. She saw women, most of them willful and attractive, all of them committed to him and his ideals. She also saw much bloodshed and battle... no, she though, not battle. She saw war. A quiet war, though by no means less hungry for the lives of the men and women who waged it. It was vivid, and it nigh overwhelmed her, but she found the strength to surmount it.
She quickly came to the realization that the man had fallen asleep, which accounted for his rambling thoughts as well as the low level of resistance she had faced on her way in. Unfortunately, there was little to be learned from watching a sleeping brain do its laundry, as she liked to call it, and she was all set to pull back when she noticed a shift occurring in the scenery.
The frantic undercurrent of memories began to ebb away, obliterated by the rise of something infinitely more commanding. It presented itself to her as a formidable body of light whose unconceivable radiance eradicated all that stood before it, but she knew from past experience that it would take on whatever shape and form she deemed fit to give it. It's purpose was to act as a lure, to draw you to it. It was a treacherous thing, as it was wholly impossible to predict what would befall her once she crossed that threshold, yet it was also an opportunity to untangle some of the mystery that shrouded their new houseguest, which was precisely the reason for her incursion. Tentatively, she reached for the light...
* * *
Isahiah woke up in a daze, his body and mind sluggish from having roused too quick. He got to his feet and fumbled around for his shoes, which failed to turn up anywhere, then decided someone had nabbed them in the course of his sleep and stormed up the ladder in a huff. "I bet it's that Tam girl," he thought. "Oh, I'll show her..." He yanked the hatch open and emerged from the access shaft and into the hallway... except it wasn't the right hallway.
Instead of subdued lighting and deep blue tones, he saw rows of wires and cables bound together by plastic restraints as well as tin ducts and sturdy metal pipes running the length of the hall behind the robust steel grating that acted as its bulkheads and flooring.
"What now..." he thought. As he took a first step into this nameless space, he acknowledged the merit of such a crude design. It allowed for easier access to the ship's inner workings should a problem arise, at the price of eye-appeal. He deemed it to be quite sensible. And then it dawned on him. "This... is the Dandelion," he murmured. "My old boat."
He ambled through the ship's halls for what felt like an eternity. He didn't recall them being so intricately entangled and homogenous in appearance, and had a difficult time finding his bearings. He came across a few familiar faces. Kip Bartley, his right-hand man, a loyal soldier, infamous womanizer and furious brawler who had served under him for nearly a decade. And Anya, his old flame. She had stuck with him through thick and thin. She cast her striking green eyes upon him and gave an earnest smile before pressing herself against the grating, allowing him to move by her. He met others as well, but their features were blurred, as if clouded by the passage of time.
Finally, he came against a sealed blast door. Its actuators whirred to life as he approached, prompting its massive halves to slide apart and granting him access to the adjoining room. It was sparsely lit and overrun with machines, with a set of two bulky spinning contraptions taking up most of its v
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"Vivid Dreams." John knew how those felt, and unfortunately, river had jsut gon ethrough someone else's. John felt bad about using her in this way, but he wanted to be safe. "You okay, darlin?" "Yeah." "What do you think?" "He's been through things." "Who hasn't." "Couldn't get details, too much else." "Gorramit. Thanks." "You're welcome."
John walked out of the hallway and toward his room. He stood at the door and considered sleep. He realized he wouldn't be able to. He walked into the room and began to compose a wave on the portable cortex link, but decided against it. Some people he didn't want to talk to right then, even if he needed too.
johnttf
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