Way back when, the official Serenity site used to hold contests to win prizes, or points to trade for prizes. One of them was to write a short account of the first Reaver sighting. This was my entry…

Tragedy at Evensong

[A flashing news logo swoops over scenes of cheerful celebrities, violent criminal smackdowns, spaceship races, and marching crowds. CUT TO: a dangerously over-makeupped woman sitting behind the desk, which is apparently floating in front of a huge, colorful snack treat.]

MINDY: Good evening. I’m Mindy Chin and this is the Socko Evening News, brought to you by Blue Sun’s Fruity Oaty Bars. Fruity Oaty Bars, they’re socko! Tonight our own Ed Flansom reports on a massacre going on as we speak at the border planet Evensong. Ed?

[CUT TO: ED, who is huddled underneath a burning hot dog stand. There is smoke everywhere, blood is running down his face, and screams can be heard in the distance.]

ED: Mindy? Oh God, Mindy? Is that you?

MINDY (OS): Ed, you’re on live. What’s going on there? Aren’t you covering Evensong’s Unification Festival?

ED: Send help, Mindy! Reavers have attacked the settlement! I barely escaped with my life, they were killing and… oh, God… eating people…

[CUT TO: Mindy, still smiling.]

MINDY: Reavers? Ed, how wonderful! The festival has a costume party. I must admit the makeup is incredible, you look—

ED: It’s not a joke! They’re here! They’re here and I think they’re coming after us!

MINDY: That’s an astounding accusation, Ed, and we’ll look into this immediately. We’ll be right back with Ed Flansom’s amazing story right after this.

[CUT TO: Brightly colored, animated, huge-headed children sing while the background flashes fast enough to cause seizures in the elderly.]

CHILDREN: Fruity Oaty Bars, you need nothing more, Fruity Oaty Bars, buy at any store, Fruity Oaty Bars, they’re what we cry for, Fruity Oaty Bars, vita-fun galore!

[CUT TO: full-face closeup of the lead singer.]

CHILD: Buy it! Buy it now!

[CUT TO: News logo, fading into Mindy’s face.]

MINDY: Ed? Are you still there?

[An inset picture of Ed appears over her shoulder. He seems to be holding the camera himself and it shakes back and forth as he works.]

MINDY: Ed, you look like you’re burying yourself in rubble. Could you tell us about that please?

ED: Shhh! Dammit, shut up! They got the cameraman. They pulled him apart, Mindy! Right in front of me! If his jacket hadn’t slowed them up they would have gotten me too! All that blood, and those horrible ripping noises, and the smell–

MINDY: Ed, what about the festival?

ED: There is no gorram festival! These terrible ships all but crashed on us and these, these, creatures came out, just shooting and slashing and raping and biting, Mindy! It’s a little hard to stay gorram festive when you’re being slaughtered!

MINDY: Has there been any word from the Evensong authorities?

ED: Authorities? You want the authorities? Ha ha ha! Here, here you go…

[He ducks as an explosion goes off nearby and legs wrapped in dirty skins and ragged bits of leather rush past. Then, mutterfing to himself, he scrabbles in the piles of wreckage off-camera and produces most of the bloody head of a middle-aged man who obviously died in a great deal of pain.]

ED: Here! Here’s the mayor! Ask him! Wait, hang on, some of the chief constable rolled by a minute ago—

MINDY: Hold yourself together, Ed. We’ll be right back with Ed’s report, and a look at the world of sports, after this.

[CUT TO:  A teenage girl sitting on the table in an examination room. She looks pensive. There is a skeleton in the corner. The doctor, an attractive, dark-haired man, enters carrying a clipboard.

GIRL: Am I going to be all right, Doctor?

DOCTOR: I won’t lie to you, Merrilee, you nearly died from twenty or thirty different diseases and yucky ailments. But good for you, you’ve been eating Fruity Oaty Bars!

[The doctor spins his clipboard around to display the Fruity Oaty Bar logo.]

DOCTOR: Thanks to their high levels of fun and their recommended daily requirement of happiness, your diet of Fruity Oaty Bars did the trick!

GIRL: Oh, how can I ever thank you, Doctor?

[The doctor explodes and out of the explosion leap the singing children from before, who begin dancing with the girl. The skeleton raises its head.]

SKELETON: Buy it! Buy it now!

[CUT TO: The Socko Evening News logo, and Mindy. The inset of Ed can still be seen over her shoulder.]

MINDY: We have with us now General Harolt Glencoe, commander of the Alliance’s  peace-keeping forces in that area. General Glencoe, how are you, sir?

[An image of a distinguished officer appears over Mindy’s other shoulder. He is calm and rested. As he speaks, the silent image of Ed Flansom continues to cover himself with bits of charred wood and smoldering bodies.]

GLENCOE: Quite well, thank you for asking.

MINDY: General, can you tell us about the brutal attack on Evensong?

GLENCOE: Alleged attack, Ms. Chin. Alleged. We have had no reports at all of any attack on a settlement in our jurisdiction, brutal or otherwise. And I assure you, if there was such an impossible thing as a band of half-clothed, cannibalistic, insanely violent, unstoppable man-beasts going around raping eating, and killing people, we would know about it.

MINDY: Ed, your response?

ED: Is he crazy? Are you all crazy? Look around!

[Ed spins the camera about, but all that can be made out is greasy black smoke and a rapidly spreading fire. Ed turns the camera back. He is now completely buried except for one hand and his eyes.]

ED: See? See?

MINDY: Ed, we can’t make out the surroundings. Could you get in and talk to one of the attackers? We need to get their side.

[Ed just stares at her, stunned and bleeding freely. The general chuckles to himself.]

GLENCOE: Reavers are boogeymen, Mindy. The Alliance has successfully denied their existence for months. This is one of those Resistance Recreation groups, no doubt. Always re-enacting the War for Unification every year, they wear the outfits and everything. I was in one two years ago with the people on Shadow and the Browncoats lost then, too, ha! But it was all in good fun and we had lemonade afterwards.

[Ed has by now succeeded in completely burying himself and has left the camera on its side. The fire consuming the debris around him starts creeping towards his air hole. Suddenly the camera viewpoint spins crazily and we get the fastest glimpse possible of a bestial figure before teeth flash and the inset picture goes black.]

MINDY: Ed? Ed? We seem to have lost contact with Ed Flansom, but we’ll check back right after this important word from our sponsors. General, thank you for being here with us tonight and answering our questions about the specter of marauding, unholy  savages, the implications of which could have affected all of humanity forever.

GLENCOE: My pleasure.

MINDY: Next up, Wiff Yanklee with tonight’s scoreboard, and then Barbara Chang will be here with something new from the Ariel City Zoo.