Title: All the Reasons Why
Author: FigFan
Rating: PG.
Summary: But somewhere between the flying and the grounding and the thieving, they find themselves looking for the same thing.
Spoilers: Just the series. And little things at that. Nothing huge.
Disclaimer: I don't own 'em. I'd have fun if I did though.
Oh yeah, this is my first Firefly fic. Probably not the most polished thing in the world, but the voices just started talking to me. Can't stop the voices. Maybe they'll stick around.
Feedback is shiny. FigFan2002 at yahoo dot com
The list of reasons why they shouldn't work is as long as the 'verse is vast.
He thinks she's a goddess. She thinks he's a cocky pilot with a gorram crazy mustache.
She shoots people for a living, and has come to terms with it-as much as anyone can. He shoots people as a last resort, and feels cold for days afterwards.
"You ever think about it?" He thinks about everything. Makes him who he is.
"No thinkin'. Just doin'. Thinkin' about it makes it part of you. Can't have that." She finishes loading up her gun and straps it to her side. "Job don't get done then."
She is stoic, reserved, business like. His shirts are loud, his hair is unruly, he wears his heart on his sleeve.
He plays with dinosaurs. She doesn't play at all.
"I have you now!" He moves the T-Rex across the console, towards the unknowing brontosaurus. A cough from behind startles him, and his plastic friends scatter about the switches and screens in front of him.
She is leaning against the wall, face blank.
He grabs the T-Rex and holds it out towards her, innocent smile spreading across his face. "Wanna play?"
"Don't have time for games, pilot. Work to be done. Captain wants to know how long til atmo." She turns and leaves the bridge.
He doesn't try to hide his disappointment.
She joined on to ground herself, to get a sense of home when she thought there weren't nothing left like that. He joined on to fly away.
But somewhere between the flying and the grounding and the thieving, they find themselves looking for the same thing.
And they come together.
The ship doesn't stop flying when he kisses her for the first time in the cargo bay. Their jobs don't change the first morning she reports for duty after leaving his bunk. She is still the first mate, he is still the pilot.
But there is change. He still can't shoot a gun without thinkin' 'bout it afterwards. But she's there to warm him up, tell him that what needed to be done was done, and there ain't nothing wrong with that.
She sees him as more than a damn good pilot now. Now he knows she's a goddess.
He's teaching her how to play.
"Why do you like them so much?"
He's surprised this question hasn't come up sooner. She is perched on the console to the left of him, watching him re-enact some battle from prehistoric Earth-That-Was.
"Peace."
"Peace?"
"Yeah." He swivels the chair around to look at her. "Don't get much time around here to just think. Well, you do, but it's about things you don't so much want to think about. Money, food, our fearless Captain's never ending goal to get us all killed.."
She scoffs good-naturedly.
"Here though, with the stars and the ship and the dinosaurs, it's just simple. No thinkin'. Just doin'."
She folds her arms across her chest. "Thought bringin' you peace was my job." She tries to act serious, hurt almost, but he can see the corners of her mouth curling up.
"Course it is, Baby." He pulls at her waist until she is sharing the chair with him, kissing her before she settles against his chest. She takes one of his dinosaurs and twirls it between her fingers. His face is buried in her hair, and his voice comes out muffled. "Dino's don't talk back though."
A plastic tail stabs him in the stomach, and he just laughs.
Hawaiian print meets brown leather; she laughs more, he works on his serious face. He wakes up with her hair in his mouth and she still rolls her eyes at his bad jokes. They are different and the same, a couple and two separate people.
And it works.