From the curious to the curiouser. who| River Tam and [OPEN] what| River arrives, and seeing nothing wrong with wandering around unknown parts in Reaver blood, looks for bearings. where| McRandom Park, LA when| Late Evening, Early Morning. rating| PG-13, for corpsified Reavers. status| Open
For centuries, the babble of Time Travel theory had cluttered scientific debates and wasted more hours than those who studied it could hope to relive should they have ever discovered a successful way to go about it. Theories were broad, and never thinly spread, but not one of them had theorzed that, in the first .04 seconds following the instant your time had rushed foward or dashed away behind you, the roof of your mouth would taste purple.
River Tam didn't need a theory, though she could have used one. Where there had been a squadron of Alliance gunmen, there were now a row of trees. The air was, while not fresh, not the oxygen generated and regenerated by the life support systems of Mr. Universe's moon. Serenity's crew was gone, replaced by colourful, twisted structures River would not have recognized as a playground if it weren't for the swingset who's seats rocked peacefully in the evening breeze. It was dark, but not dark like the room had been before the blast doors had opened with Serenity's crew behind them, and the Alliance had ripped down the wall behind her and asaulted the area with lights and illuminating gun mounts. It was real dark. Planet dark.
Two of twenty Reaver corpses remained at her feet. She knew they were dead, but it wouldn't have mattered once the weapons she had been reestablishing her grip on slipped from her hands, tiny threads of blood breaking away from her skin from where they had snuck between her fingers and the handles. The sky wasn't making any sense. There were so few stars visible, and she didn't know any of them.
Yet.
There were things lurking and bumping in the darker places. The bodies would attract them. Leaving the remains of the Pax-mad men behind, River moved foward along the paved path, trusting her toes to tell her when the crude material it was made of gave way to grass. Her eyes were preoccuped with darting rapidly across the sky.