The story opens with a scene of Jayne as a youth in Juno,
Sycorax 33 years ago. This is the first mention of Juno, but it
may be the city that was seen in
"Fun With Dick and Jayne".
Sycorax was established as being Jayne's homeworld in
The Ghost Machine.
During the flashback scene on page 3, young Jayne is accused of
stealing from an apothecary, and Father Franklin remarks he has
broken Sycorax's seventh law: Thou shalt not steal. This may
suggest that Sycorax has a law code based on the Biblical Ten
Commandments. "Thou shalt not steal" is often listed as one of
the commandments, but not always the seventh, as the
commandments' numbering (and even the particular commandments
themselves) vary among religious denominations.
Young Jayne mentions that Mattie needs his damplung medicine.
Mattie is Jayne's brother,
first
said to suffer from damplung in "The
Message".
Page 5 switches the action to "now",
on Lilac, the second moon of New Canaan in the Blue Sun system.
Lilac was previously seen in "Triggered".
On page 5,
Jayne's attacker confronts him over his supposed status on
Higgins' Moon as the Hero of Canton, whom he believes failed his
mudder brother there.
This is a reference to "Jaynestown",
in which it's revealed that Jayne is considered a hero in the
town of Canton on Higgins' Moon for stealing money from the rich
industrialists and giving it to the poor. A mudder is a slang
term for the poor workers on Higgins' Moon, who work in the
"mud", which is collected and used as a ceramic to make parts
and other items.
Higgins' Moon (named for Magistrate Higgins) is mistakenly
spelled Higgin's Moon here and throughout this 11-part storyline.
On page 10, Mal drives a four-wheeled mule bike similar to the
one in early episodes of Firefly, notably
"War Stories". That one was
seemingly damaged badly in that episode. Presumably, this is a
different one, as it is a different color (blue-gray instead of
yellow). Serenity also has a hover-mule similar the
ones that give chase to Mal and Jayne here.
On page 13, River and Emma are playing with Wash's old dinosaur
figures.
On page 15, River remarks that Serenity's fuel cells
carry a maximum range of 400 A.U.s. A.U. is an abbreviation for
"astronomical unit", a unit of distance in space, approximately
the distance from Earth to the Sun (about 93 million miles or
8.3 light-minutes).
Page 16 is the first mention of an uncharted moon nicknamed
Requiem in the Blue Sun system.
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Episode Studies
