Disclaimer- I own Joss Whedon and therefore I also own the Firefly 'verse and all related characters by proxy. Don't believe me? Yeah, didn't think you would.

He didn't like her. Didn't hate none no more neither, but definitely didn't like her. And they weren't bonding like the women on board liked to insinuate. They were just scratching each other's itches. He wanted someone to talk to and get sweaty with out in the black and she wanted a way to block everyone out of her head. A mutually beneficial arrangement she'd called it.

Jayne hadn't agreed at first. Hadn't wanted her anywhere near him now that he knew what she could do. He didn't want her to complete what she'd started with that butcher knife when he inevitably let his guard down. After three solid weeks of doe eyes and mostly sane pleading, he'd relented. It confused and angered Simon and Mal something awful which was always a plus.

So they sweated and talked. She'd offer him advice, sometimes sounding as if she were channeling Book from the great beyond, which unnerved him more than a bit, but she didn't try to kill him. They grunted and sighed, pushed and pulled, gave and took. He helped teach her to concentrate on one thing while letting everything else become background noise and he found companionship, of sorts.

"Alright, Crazy. It's my turn." He says climbing off of her.

"But I'm not finished." River whines.

"Too bad. It's my turn."

"Just one more. Please?" she pouts. It doesn't work.

"No." he says simply, pushing her to the floor none too gently before taking her spot to remove his boots. River scowls at him for a moment then takes up her position at his feet. He clasps her hands in his own and leans back, taking her with him.

"What shall we do next?" she asks innocently, looking him straight in the eye as if she isn't floating several feet off the cargo bay floor with only his foot in her gut to support her.

The merc grunts as he bends his knee, bringing the girl closer before pushing her away, using her as a weight to exercise leg muscles who's names he can't remember. She used him in much the same way except, him being too heavy for her to lift completely, he'd leaned against her feet as she pushed at him.

"Dunno. Sit-ups, pull-ups, push-ups, weights. You choose."

Author's note: A lot of my stories just start out as a single line or a piece of dialogue that comes up to me and demands a story be written around them. Sometimes other lines and pieces of dialogue join up and say 'Hey, we'd fit in here somewhere too. Write us in.' It gets awful crowded in my head sometimes with lines and stuff demanding to be written.

For some reason, Jayne has been popping up a lot lately. He'll just show up just as I'm trying to fall asleep and say, "You know, it'd be hi-larious if'n I said this... or if I were to do this..."

I'm being haunted by a fictional TV/movie character that seems to be using me as some sort of medium. If this keeps up, I'm going to need and exorcism.