Dream - Wash and Tracey.

[badinlatin]

After this. Relaxing didn't work.

[ooc: Text from the FF episode "The Message".]

Womack has just left, allowing Mal to kneel at Tracey's side. Tracey coughs, not bringing up any blood yet, and starts, "I'm feelin'... kinda stupid right about now."

"Only cause you are," Mal offers back, quietly.

Tracey looks to Kaylee, then to all gathered there. "Kaylee. I'm sorry... Every--Everyone... Wasn't never no good at life, anyhow... Couldn't seem to make sense of it... Always running scared..." Another cough, a little blood.

"'When you can't run anymore, you crawl... and when you can't do that--'

Comments

[flybywash]

Quiet, but harsh:

"You find someone to shoot you."

Blood runs down Wash's face freely, dripping from the bullet graze beneath his right temple. He's not looking at Tracey, though.

His eyes are fixed on Mal.

[badinlatin]

"Wash, I didn't - I wasn't out to hurt him. Poor guy didn't catch on to what we were doin'; he was gonna get us all killed."

Mal turns to Tracey, who has disappeared. Along with everyone else besides Wash and himself.

"No," Mal says to himself quietly. "This can't be happening..."

[flybywash]

"Could've told him. Could've explained. Ten words, Mal, maybe less."

He doesn't wipe away the blood.

"You fought with him."

[badinlatin]

"The boy didn't understand. He thought we would give 'im up. How is that my fault?" Mal's voice has become a little more excitable, and he walks closer to Wash.

"How is this my fault?" Mal asks. Pleads.

[flybywash]

"You gonna get in a habit of killing the rest of your platoon? 'Cause," a small laugh, "I'd kind of like to know before I wake up and find my wife with a bullet in her gut. Sergeant."

[badinlatin]

Mal can't even speak for a moment after Wash suggests that he would do such a thing.

"Wash," Mal attempts to reason, "Zoe is my best friend. I would never---"

"Never what, Sergeant?" Tracey moves out from behind Wash, shirt slicked with blood. Tracey is now holding Mal's gun. He knows its his gun, as it looks like it first off. And that Mal's gun is no longer in its holster.

Mal's own gun is trained on him.

[flybywash]

As if just becoming aware of the gash on his forehead, Wash touches his fingers to the wound, takes them away to examine the blood.

"'Course," he says conversationally, "obeying direct orders tends to push you a little closer into the almost-killed category, too." Tapping his fingertips together, gingerly, he looks up. "Not sure I blame him for not listening. It's a smart move."

[badinlatin]

Mal, even though he's listening to Wash, is more focused on the gun Tracey's pointing at him.

"Tracey...you ain't carryin' a bullet for me in there now are ya?"

[flybywash]

Tracey's response is swift, wordless, and eloquent.

BANG.

[badinlatin]

Mal's been shot in the stomach before. He knows what it's like.

It wasn't like this before.

Mal falls backward with the force of the shot to his kidney, the metal burning hot somewhere within him.

He can only simply stare at Tracey and Wash, who now appear to be grinning at one another.

[flybywash]

And Wash is still smiling when he squats down next to Mal, arms folded across his knees.

"Just doing what I can to protect the people I love," he says. "Learned it from the best."

[badinlatin]

Mal begins to have problems swallowing. Then seeing straight.

However, he does manage to focus his eyes on Tracey waving goodbye to him jovially before he can't really see in color anymore. Before he closes his eyes...

And wakes up in his bunk.

Tracey... Mal stands shakily and goes to his near-bare bookshelf, thumbing through pictures. There's one in a small wooden box - Mal, Zoe, Tracey, Macauley, the rest of the guys.

As soon as Mal opens the box to see it resting on the top of the pile inside, he throws the box against a wall of his bunk, pulls on a shirt, and climbs out.