//------------------------------//
// Chapter 2: Unwelcome guests 
// Story: The dead breath of of Space. 
// by TheDoctor 
//------------------------------//

As the Serenity cuts its way though space Damon makes his way do to the infirmary to see how Dreamfly is holding up. As the captain works his way down to the bottom of the ship where the infirmary is housed. As he opens the door and looks around the small white room he smiles to see Dream awake."Hey, good job Dutch, Once again I am glad we took you with us!" 
Dreamfly looks at the captain and smiles some."You can put me down that easy..."
She coughs weakly and dutch says."Hey dont talk so much, You are running on one lung right now.”
Dreamfly nods and lays back in her bed.
Damon smiles and walks out of the room to let Dutch get back to his work. As he makes his way down one of the corridors Carrot comes out of her room. “Oh why hello captain, how is Dream doing?”
Damon smiles. “Better, looks like she is going to be fine, just going to need to sit out for a bit! 
Carrot smiles and says. “That’s great captain, glad to hear that she is doing better!” 
Damon smiles and begins to walk up to the bridge, but after walking only a few feet carrot says. ”Hey.. Hey Captain…?”
Damon turns around. “Yeah, what is it carrot?”
Carrot stand there for second without saying anything thing, than out of no where she leans in and kisses the captain.
Damon does not know what to do so he does nothing, for a few seconds he just stands there in shock  After the first few seconds Damon pulls away and walks up to the Control room with out a word. 
Carrot frowns and says. “Sorry…”Than returns to her room.





As Damon enters the upper deck he sighs and sits back in a chair, not knowing what to do he scans over the controls. Not much happens over the next half hour, Damon sighs as he stands to exit the control room, he needs to talk to carrot. Than all of a sudden a siren goes off on the radar and Damon turns around to see what is happening. He stairs at the radar for a few minuets with out seeing anything, than it he sees it,  It is a large reaver vessel  a little under half an hour away from the ship, heading right towards them.
Damon sighs as he backs away from the console and heads for the door, reavers were trouble, they were a group of blood thirst raiders that were only out to kill for fun, they often only killed the men at first, than they would take the women and children and either sell them as slaves or kill them… 




As Damon works his way down the stairs he runs into carrot. “Captain… I was just coming to tell you I am sorry about earlier…”
Damon sighs and says. “Carrot…Its fine…”
Carrot blinks and says. “But…you seemed upset when you stormed off…”
Damon nods and says. “Yeah…but…” Than he stops himself an says.” But now is not the time, there is a reaver ship coming right at us we need to do…something…”
Carrot is shocked. “Oh…but… reavers? Could it just be a passing ship?”
Damon shakes his head. “No its them… they will be on this ship in under half an hour…”
Carrot who somehow manages to keep her childlike smiles going says. “Guess we have a nice little fight on are hoofs than!”
Damon smiles some.” Yeah we do, guess we need to get to work. You go tell Dutch, I will grab the weapons and meet you in the infirmary. We are going to have to hold out there because we cant move Dream!”
Carrot nods and takes off to find Dutch. Damon pulls out his revolver and checks to see if its loaded, once he is happy he puts it back and runs down to the armory.




Damon stacks the last of the crates blocking off the rear hallway as he finshes his work he checks his rifle once more out of habbit and says to his crew. “Ok we are I don’t know how we are going to do this but we are going kill everyone of these Reavers, if my plan works out they are only going to have one hallway to come down, that one.” He says as he points his hoof at the only hall way that is not sealed off, the group nods and Damon says.” They are going to be here any minute so be ready…”
Dutch who is finishing up moving Dream out of the line of fire says. “How many do you think are on that ship?”
Damon sighs.” Fifty, maybe more…”
Carrot laughs nervously . “Well here we go, listen you can hear the ship right outside!”
Everypony is quite as there is a loud hollow thud and than a faint explosion, than they here hoofsteps,  They only have to wait a few more minutes before a pair of  scary looking ponies walk down the hall way. 
One of them says. “You think they jumped out of the airlock or something.”
The other pony says. “I hope not, I have not had fresh meat in days…”
Damon pops up from behind a crate and takes aim at the two, before they can react Damon takes them down with two clean shots to the head each.
As Damon crouches behind cover once again Carrot takes aim and waits for the next group of thugs to show up. Its not long before a large brute of a pony walks down the hall and says. “Did you find them?”
He stumbles over the body of one of the dead colts and lets out a startled yell before carrot can drop him, she also crouches down and loads another round into her rifles magazine and says. “Three down!”
Damon smiles and says.” Yeah, lets just hope they don’t come in bigger groups!”
As Damon finshes saying that a very large creature that is standing on its hind legs walks down the hall, not even noticing its fallen comrades, yelling something in a language none of the ponies on the ship had heard. Three more follow behind the beast and Damon looks at carrot who is worried. “NOW!” Damon yells and the two open fire, At first they think that they can handle this fight, but as the fist of the three falls the other two open fire, spraying rounds down the hall, both carrot and damon duck behind the cover. 
Damon yells over his shoulder. “Hey dutch, we could s some help!”
As if a reply to Damons shout a round flys down the hall and drops one of the beasts, than another, and with that Dutch yells. ”Well, that was strange…”
Damon sighs. “Lets hope they don’t have any more slitheen…”

The group waits for the next ten minutes with out a sound than carrot asks. “Do you think they are gone?”
Damon shakes his head. “No… they are just planning…”
Carrot nods her head without a word.  Than out of no where the is a scream from behind the two, they see Dutch on the ground fighting with one of the savage ponies. 
Damon raises his rifle and shoots the pony off Dutch and yells. They made it though the back hallway, Dutch you need to keep it covered!”
Dutch nods as he gets back to his hooves and wipes some blood from his face. “Can do captain…”
Than a yell comes from the hall in front of Damon and Carrot, As they take am A small hord of at least twenty ponies and slitheen run down the hall way fireing there weapons. The two ponies take down as meny as they can but than Damon takes a stray round, it hits him right in the chest, he hit’s the ground and trys to keep his eyes open. As he watches carrot is soon overrun and a few of the ponies drag try to drag her back to there ship, than the next thing Damon knows somepony is dragging him, as he turns around it is Dutch, he has a lot of blood flowing from a gash in his face and forleg, As Damon looks back to see what happened to carrot he frowns as the goup starts to pull back, still carrying the screaming carrot…
Damon trys to get to Carrot as he crshes the skull of one of the invadein ponies something hits the back of damons head and he blacks out…