Somedays
by Marsh1
( A "Firefly" fanfic spanning from just after the events of "Serenity" to many years later but only referring to the TV show & film as canon.)
(someday #137)
"That which is is a shell floating in an infinitude of that which is not." - Sir Arthur Eddington, physicist, 1928
She won't stop leaving tokens for Zoe. She won't stop purring. She won't stop singing from the catwalks. Urdu, I think. Whenever we land she climbs atop Serenity, stretches her arms out wide and caterwauls to the far horizon.
Zoe still isn't speaking.
Jayne, if you can believe it, has been a godsend. He keeps River busy. They fight with long sticks. When she inevitably wins she squeals the unearthliest squeal of delight, like a museum-piece modem's conception of the call of the wild, all static and tremulous squee. She is wildly delighted because victory has reaped her reward. It has earned her the right to climb Jayne. She scampers straight up there, stands one foot on a shoulder and the other atop his thick skull, then he tries to shake her off, make her toes touch the ground, without the use of his hands or tools and he has to stand in place. if he tries to cheat, which he inevitably does, she punishes him. Hard. It really is an experience just to witness it. Sometimes they do a more clowning variety if there are children about. He can throw her up so high she does three complete somersaults before she lands on him. The kids go crazy, of course, but my heart skips a beat every single time.
Yesterday, after his huffing surrender, she slid her legs down around the sides of his head, plopped down on his shoulders, leaned over and kissed him wetly on the cheek. Then, in a blinking instant, she sprang back up to launch herself at the underside of the catwalk, grabbed it, jackknifed and was gone into Inara's shuttle, leaving the thinnest whisper of a giggle hanging in the air.
"GOR-ram," was all he said for a moment, rubbing his neck and then smelling his fingers. (I try not to think about this.) "I don't think she was wearing no panties." On the bright side, at least now I know what my stomach lining tastes like, like dead feet and cabbage, apparently.
Meanwhile, Zoe won't leave Mal's side when we're on the clock. The Captain never orders her to do otherwise. She won't or can't hold eye contact with anyone. Doesn't say anything, just stands there and does what she's told when she's told. Mal won't talk about it but the strain on him is as obvious as a nova next door. When he says work's done, she turns on a heel and heads straight to her quarters.
I don't think she's there at all.
I'm beginning to hear the engine with Kaylee's ear. The slips in calibration. The complaints. The high-performance exhalations. It truly is a chorus, so musical. Satisfying beyond words when all is well and a comfort, mostly, knowing why when all is not.
I've been hearing the engine in my dreams. Kaylee claims that officially makes me a space dog. Excuse me. A space daawwwwggg. Something in a Pekinese, that's her guess. Personally, I see a terrier.
You know what else she said to me this morning? "Lordy, I could lick every inch of you." How could anyone not love her? She makes rations seem a lovely feast.
But back to my intended thought. The tokens. Every day River ties these little treasures on Zoe's hatch to greet her as she emerges in the morning. For whatever reason, Zoe ignores them completely during the day, as if she didn't even see them, but unties them ever so gently and takes them to bed with her when she goes. They're nothing really. Scraps of wire and various bits of detritus bent into vivid shapes. Frenetic sculptures that fit in the palm of your hand. Zoe must have dozens down there by now. I've only actually seen River make one, the first, but she becomes furious if anyone on the ship attempts to touch them, even the Captain. And she will know it from anywhere on the ship if you are foolish enough to do so. I can't explain it but the whole thing seems a sad, waltzing sort of conversation.
If an absolute good has come from all this pain and madness (besides getting the blue-tinted jackals to cease their guerre a outrance against River once and for all) its that Mal and Inara are finally talking. No banter, taunts or insults. Talk. As if it were pouring out of them. Mostly when Z is in her bunk, but not always. Not surprisingly, I credit Z herself with this near-miraculous turn of events. (We all know how Mal can get.) Just before she fell silent, Zoe really let him have it regarding the utter waste of the thing. 'She stuck it to him and then she broke it off,' as Kaylee would say. I'm ashamed to admit I overheard this conversation. It's hard not to on this ship sometimes.
". . . And you two don't have to hide your happiness from me, sir."
"We're not. . ."
"In point of fact, I rather wish you wouldn't."
"Hmm. Huuh."
"Life is short."
Mal, of course, said nothing.
"Life is short and if you are not man enough to handle that then you are not the man I thought you were, siiir."
To the best of my knowledge, those are the last words she spoke. River started crafting her treasures the next morning. Something akin to a swan lifting off. There was quite a scene when she gave it to Zoe at mess that night. Z cried. Just broke down right there and bawled big, gasping sobs. We were all shocked, and more than a little relieved.
I wish I had gotten to know him better. I wish I had paid him half as many kindnesses as he gave me. He certainly deserved them, and more.
Book.
Oh, Sheperd Book. I hope I'm wrong about you. Jayne's been reading the Good Book though, on the sly. One does wonder.
We're bound for a new moon. I'm told among wayward folk such as ourselves it is the most stringently upheld of traditions to throw a party the night before setting down somewhere no one on the ship has ever been before. Kaylee is making a dress for Zoe, to give her as a present that night. River, of course, is fascinated. She worries that becoming a dress will disappoint the leather.
I don't think I've ever been more at peace than I was last night, just watching Kaylee set up in bed, working that thick stitch in our quarters' warm glow and humming little ditties to herself while I pretended to read Mishima Minear. i wouldn't mind one bit if Eternity were those few hours.
Jayne came to see me in his best shirt, just after breakfast. I'd say it was needless to say I saw him coming a mile away but Kaylee was the one. He hemmed and sputtered and kept flattening his hair while he asked permission from me to court River. I told him if it were up to me there wouldn't be a chance in ovine-humping Hades. I couldn't resist. You should've seen his face. But then I dutifully reminded him that if indeed such a thing ever came to pass, neither he nor I would likely have much say in the matter. He seemed greatly relieved.
The Captain.
Oh, my Captain.
My Captain. I am beginning to despair for the man. I fear he's going to be carrying around that look in Zoe's eyes for a long, long time. Thank the seven sisters for Inara and her honeyed ways.
Zoe's leaving the crew. "Just to set for a spell," or so she says. River looks worried. I think Z can't stop chewing over and over and over yet again on that Operative. I think she means to seek him out. I think she means to die. Captain didn't say a word, just put out his hand.
We can all hear her sharpening knives in there. Shhhhhhkkt. Shhhhhkt. Shhhkkt.
I used the encyclopedia to translate River's song today. Can't say why I didn't think to do it earlier. It is Hungarian. Two lines, repeatedly endlessly. "I cannot have seen the light. I saw the light." Sometimes it is a plaintive moan. Sometimes it as peppy as a Blue Sun superliminal. It's always different, it's always the same.
River is in love. She told him just before she left with Zoe. "Love is the best thing ever. It's waiting in the lion's mane," is how she plainly stated it to me. "Besides," she added, "He likes my bits and I like his big. . ." i stopped her right there. The second the shuttle was clear and away, Jayne passed out cold. I've never seen Mal or Inara laugh so hard. He literally turned purple with his paroxysms and she resembled an overturned turtle. Kaylee, out of deference, tried to restrain herself. Tried.
It's hard to talk about murder with someone who won't stop skipping.
"Did she? River, stop. Stop. Did she?"
"She did. . .not. She knotted him instead, made him swear an oath. Naughty. Naughty. Empty shell of himself."
"An oath? What kind of oath?
"A double-barreled pledge, she called it. Said a soul was either capable of anything or guilty of nothing. That one couldn't have it both ways and it was time for him to decide."
"And did he?"
"Not 'til she cocked the hammers back. Even then, he took his time."
"Of course."
"Of course, 'of course'."
Said the horse. Got a .wav from father today, pleading with us to return home. He was weeping, but it played hollow and shrill. Purely pro forma. Showed it to River. She made a wet raspberry sound, then a colorful gesture and said, ".Wav this." i considered it for a delicious second but settled on deafening silence. Or perhaps just to tell him, in extravagant detail, all about Jayne. And not to look for us. We are already home.
Finally. Completely. Home.
Free.
"The difference between the right word and the wrong word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug." - Mark Twain
(someday #314)
The warrior's age has passed. Most who lay claim to the title are merely exceedingly violent. They know nothing of honor or code or the stillness found on the other side of fear. I brought calm. Reason. Order. Order, in a universe where the darkness expands at ever-increasing velocities while the Light falls forever back into itself. "It is not the emptiness that devours us", I might have told you flatly before I ordered your screaming death. I truly thought it was 'being'.
Then came the eyes of a child. A child I had to strangle. A child who asked me not to cry with such a soft, formal voice.
Non foras ire, in interiore homine habitat veritas.
I dropped my weapon. It was then that it happened. . . There are no words. The voice, something pulled sideways in the sky, an avalanche of emotions and memories. . . A general whose lower jaw I had taken as a trophy tugged on my sleeve and told me I had been staring at a red-tailed hawk circling above us for the better part of an afternoon. It seemed a short breath to me.
Horridas nostrae mentis purga tenebras.
That circling, circling raptor. Why does it seem I have a thousand memories of you?
Why me?
I was at the Battle of Serenity Valley. As close as I can calculate, I murdered 121 Browncoats there. Came straight out of that wicked sun and swooped down low while they were waiting for evac. Was doing them a favor, that's what I told myself. Least ways, hardly any ran.
The voice. it spoke to me plain as my telling. "Even here, I am." That's what it said. And the comedy? The colossal thing that had me grinning like a simpleton? Somehow, deep in my gut, I knew the voice wasn't speaking to me. it was speaking to the child but I was the only one who could hear it now.
I felt the Operative coming to Haven. I smelled him on the air. He called me by name. I forgave him, as I forgive all, but I couldn't let him walk on, God forgive me. it was a reflex and the last of my personal demon, pride. I had never been the hunted before. Six months, a year at most, and he will die writhing for what he did. Seemed the least I could do.
Mal must never know. Mal must run. Run.
Men like me are not born but we are born ready, like the broken stick of some mad scion's sealing wax. That's another thing i used to tell myself I was, merely something melted and shaped by a hollow symbol into its final form.
A crest familial stolen, a boon legendary or terrifying, it mattered not one whit what a signet's order sent me to do or why. Their authority, my purpose. We are all, us fragile and twisting things, one madman or another's sealing wax. This, I insisted upon. Hmpfh. But it is a cowardice, an ignoble detachment. One must choose. One must.
All glory to God, even here in the last flickering shadows.
I choose life.
Even here. Love. Love. Love.
Peace be unto you all. Please don't cry.
"The monosyllable of the Clock is Loss, Loss, Loss, unless you devote your heart to its opposition." - Tennessee Williams
someday #212 ( in which the dear reader gets to experience Jayne's idea of a jailbreak wherein he, in fact, breaks the jail while making like a half-ass Wotan.)
The Good Book says, "For our contention is not with flesh and blood, but with dominion and authority, with the world-ruling powers of this dark age, with the spirit of evil in things Heavenly." Yeah. Huh. I like that sound of that.
Mal's in the sling and the thinkin's up to me. (Yeah, I know. Shut up.) He's top story and third cell from the right. Seems to be some kind of guard station right there. I've been watching him for days now through my rifle scope, rotting in that hole. This is exactly why I always carry big eyes with me. Don't think he's set much in the last few hours. Gettin' hanged at dawn'll have that effect on a fella. He wrote a letter earlier and cried some, I think, but I'll never tell. it's just so gorram frustratin'. Can't hardly see him thru all the red scrub. So frustratin'. Give me a three-foot machete and half an afternoon and I'd clear that fast-growing stand out of there, pretty as you please. Maybe he can get me a message somehow. A plan. I don't know. Wait. Scrub. Red scrub. Benders, and big ones. Huh.
I quick found some rope and stole an old mining pan. I flattened it out, punched a hole in the middle, scratched a note with my sharpest toothpicker and threaded the rope through the pan. From cover later that night, I gave it a few twirls and tossed it up to Mal, real quiet-like. Got it on the first try. Always been lucky, though, when it came to larceny. Mal threaded the ropes around the bars like the note asked and then lowered the other end to me. I tied it around my waist and dog-paddled back across that vicious little crik they got there, using the first end for a guide back. Something brushed against my leg in the muddy water, so I kicked it real good. Then I quick shimmied up the scrub I had tied the first end to, set myself and started pulling on the other end. Sure enough. I'm a genius. A certified god of the criminal instinct. It's why my eyes are still drawn like little magnets to open windows even though I ain't had to crawl through one since before I grew shorthairs. If it's in ya, it's in ya. Dang, I'm good. Whew haa. The tree starts to bend and then bow the more I pull on it. Before too long my boots are spitting distance from the roof and Mal's cell, the higher branches right on the roof. Guards look to be sleeping and no folks in the street. Not even a yapping mutt and there's always a yapping mutt. That's a relief. They's too confident, I guess. Pretty moon, though.
"Cap'n. Hey, Cap'n."
"Jayne? Where'd you. . . What in the name of Stinky Pete. . . Holy. You are aware, aren't you, that you are sitting on a giant catapult basically and it will fling you a country mile if this here rope should slip?"
"Huh. Sure. (Not really. Hadn't occurred to me. Dang. It's strainin' pretty hard.) But I'm bustin' you out, Cap'n."
"Jaayyyyynnnee. . . "
"Shh. Trust me. This is what I do."
"What's your plan?"
"Across the roof and a thermal into the guard station. Sweep out what's left. Get you out and run."
"Jayne."
"What? It's a good plan, Cap'n. I got three full bandoliers and a sack of thermal grenades. I kept the plan simple and played to my strengths like you're always tellin' me. I'm good to go, Mal."
"A - there's two dozen down there if there's one. B - not a one of them deserves your kind of Christmas present. Well, maybe one."
" 'Deserves' is an awful funny. . ."
"They're good folk, Jayne. Mostly. Present circumstances notwithstanding."
"So you'd rather swing than. . ."
"I'd rather a lot of things, Jayne. I'd rather have not shot that kid. I'd rather not. . ."
"What?"
"Get back to the ship. Plaster's cracking. Go on. Git. You got a woman that depends on you now."
"Awww. That's low, Mal."
"I mean it, man. Go. Don't argue with me. You are out of time. Go. . .Damn it, don't look at me like that. My story's over. Serenity is yours now. Yours and River's. But mostly River's. I suspect Zoe won't want anything to do with her once I'm gone. She'll head for high ground. Just promise me one thing."
"Gorram it, Mal. I'm here now. It's not too late. I ain't. . ."
"Inara. . .Track her down for me?. . .Ask her. . .Tell her she can ride free as long as she wants, if she wants. . .and could you tell her for me i would take it as a real kindness if she stuck around a few whiles. . .kept meSerenity company. . .yes, a true kindness. . . Tell her. . . i never felt so alone as when I woke up knowing she was gone and tellhershe'stherealestpersonIevermetandthebestIwassoluckyIdon'tcareifshewasborninapicklejarandIdonotcaresheisbarrenallthattalkwasjustIthoughtshe. . .Jayne?"
Mal's eyes were way past wild now. I ain't ashamed to say it unnerved me plenty. "Yeah?"
"After I'm gone, don't let her die inside. Promise me."
That's when the wall gave way.
"Well, I'll be. Fortune do favor the humongous, as they say."
I was back now at the foot of the wall, his window bars under the hooves of my horse.
"Nice to see you too."
"Gorram, Jayne, this whole town must be passed out cold. That was quite a shriek. How far'd you fly?"
"Gor. . . dang it, Mal. I know you're teasin'. i know it to be true but. . ."
"To the grave, buddy. To the grave."
"Thank you. Now then, I reckon I covered a coupla hundred meters easy. Then some trees and a horse broke my fall."
"I'm sorry. Whisper louder. Did you just say 'horse' or 'whore'? That horse? Cuz. . ."
"Horse. I said 'horse' and it was different one. Palamino. Big sucker too. Twenty hands easy."
"That is a mite gi-nor-mic. What do you suppose they put in the water around here?"
"I don't know but it tastes like pig crotch."
"Good to know."
"Mal, I'm telling you, I had a moment once I came to. The other horse was there, the one I landed on, whinnying low and looking at me like it knew my mamma's name, asking me to finish it. It had knocked into something in the crash, a torch or sumthin and its muzzle was on fire, smoldering like. Smelled revoltin'. it was then I had this moment like I was one with all that ever was or will be. My whole body shook like crazy. I was electric and everything was beautiful. I gave that horse the biggest hug I could, said thanks, kissed it even and then I put two in its head."
No answer.
"I cried some, Mal."
"I bet."
"I figure if all that's not a sign I'm workin' for the Big Man now, I don't know what is."
"Comin' back here could give it a run."
"Think nuthin' of it. Listen I been running my hands over the foundation while we was chattin' and I can feel some real lean. Cracks too, all up along here. I think we busted it pretty good. I think we yank on this wall hard enough and it's gonna come right over. Listen though, I'm gonna throw you the rope again. Run it through that crack in the floor yonder. If I stand up on my saddle I think I can shimmy that high and snag it. And if you could loop a sheep shank on the end I'd sure appreciate it. Lost most of the skin on my hands."
"Say that again."
I hold up my hands and show them all wrapped up in the halves of a fat kid's shirt i found. Some sort of freak animal on them. Ugly, ugly horses with humped backs. When I try to twiddle my fingers it looks like a dang stampede.
"Lost most of the skin from the palms of my hands. Don't sweat it though. Got the emergency vest Simon made for me. Painkillers cutting the edge some for four more hours or so. I can grab and grip but the dexterity, finger-moving stuff? I'm done. C'mon, we gotta go. Folks be stirring soon."
Mal ran the rope like I asked while trying to tell me something but i don't know if it was the meds or all the blows to the head in a short amount of time or what but suddenly I'm puking and there's this huge buzzing noise like diesel skeeters swarmin' around my head and I can't hear a word he's saying. I get my end of the rope and manage to fix it around the pommel with the sides of my paws. "Yah!," I say between my teeth and we are off. Not much room this side of the crik so I drop down to sideride and cut a hard angle, hoping enough momentum will. . .bring the wall down on top of me. That was about when I realized my second mistake. The taut rope was purt near straight up and down when I took off but now an image slams my brain of the rope taking my leg clean off then jerking the horse back off its feet and smashing me good. It is about to do just that when the wall gives way all on its own. Lucky. So lucky. Anyways, I ain't whipped an animal since. Seemed the least I could do.
Through the dust I can start to see Mal standing there in shock, the whole dang wall gone, gone, gone. I yelled at him to hurry and that's when the whole quartersection gave way. Now he was gone. Happened fast. Alarms finally went up, natch, but it was the early phase. Broken dishes and hollering. When you here somebody barkin' and boots clomping in rhythm, that's when it's time to go. Cleared Mal out of the rubble; no sweat. Checked him. Broken wrist. No sweat. I can brace that on the fly. Legs? Okay. Pat the torso like Simon shown me. No bloating or wet gravel under his skin. Nuthin' too tender. Good. He can travel though he's out cold. Have to carry him. Uuuhhfff. Never thought I'd be glad he ain't been eatin'. Nuthin' but a sack of hay.
It's six hours to Serenity on foot. Three hours of meds left. The ground between here and there is broken, tough. Gullies and bogs. Prob'ly be dogs at some point. Gonna be a long day. Ah well. What was it Pops used to say? Oh yeah.
"All you need is love."
I like the sound of that. All together now. . .
(someday #81 - Kaylee Frye vs. The Stone-Faced Killer Rufus T.)
"People, when left alone, can be very kind to one another." - Daniel Schorr
I can't help but wonder if things mighta hadn't a gone better if I had set eyes on him before I heard him. Him with that long lost voice I used to get lost in back when I was just a shoot out of the ground. Oh, that deep and lovely rumble. Then I might notta had to stab him. Then I wouldn't a had to send him on the worst sort of walkabout. If only I'd seen that stare before the sweetly-scented memories of wheat fields under the harvest moons and long, slow horse rides to nowhere. He was a good and kind man once. My first everything, pretty much.
"
But that's not what happened. i heard the boy I knew and that was that. I saw the eyes but I didn't really see. Told myself all sorts of foolishness to push down the dread. But deep down. Deep down I knew. Deep down I was twitching worse than the time I someone (River prob'ly) put Jayne's special foot powder on my panties. Jerry Lee Jr. knew it too and that tabby knows her business.
Rufus T. Coleridge had changed.
"Goldilocks? Can that really be you, Goldilocks?"
"Has it been that long? You still light up like dawn in a desert of diamonds."
It's been so long since I've had sex I'm afraid they changed the rules."
"Nope. Still the same."
"We call her Jerry Lee Jr. cuz that pilot, the one I told you about, we were come back from some muck-thumping on his home planet. Exactly a year to the day he, ya know, passed. We come back on board Serenity and there she was, just a wee little kitten sunning herself in his chair and pawing a plastic dinosaur like she'd been there a thousand years. Isn't she pretty? Tell her she's pretty."
Sounds like a complicated relationship."
"Not for me."
"Well, you know the old saying, "People, when left alone, can be very kind to one another."
"Nope."
"Cap'n sez there's a whole 'verse of difference between 'outmanned' and 'outgunned'.
"I like stories where what isn't on the page is more important than what is."
"Inara sez that without compassion one inevitable becomes and creates what one despises the most. I'm more afraid of that than. . . what?"
Poor. Baby. Kay. Never had nuthin', nuthin' but a dead and crazy mamma and a pops who knows more about the inside of a bottle than he does workin', or life or anything, for that matter. Poor. . . little. . .Lee. Iron law and chit-chat. That's what you grew up with, isn't it? Kay-leeee? . . . You were just so. . .easy."
"Stop it."
"No."
That's when I ran. I grabbed Jerry Lee and ran. And ran. And led him straight back to an empty Serenity, just like he wanted me to. Stupid.
No one was there. But there's always supposed to be someone there. I was so scared. I yelled and yelled for someone to come. i could feel the time slipping past. I could feel him getting closer every second. But i couldn't think. I could barely make myself breathe. I screamed again but I knew there was no one. I was going to die alone.
He was going to take Serenity. We were already away, sub-orbital. He was going to steal her and fly her to an scowl and strip her for parts. After he split my skull to my bottom teeth, of course. He had his machete over his head and there weren't nuthin' I could do except pray for rain. I was even cried out. That's when he set eyes on Jerry Lee, staring back at him like she was sayin' "Here I am. What's it to you, bub?" It upset ol' Rufus some. In the time he took to try and shoot her I saw my chance and did what i had to do. I quick wrapped my leg around a tow chain and then I kicked him square in the jewels. Then I broke a lot of bones in his good hand with my hammer. He wasn't done, though.
"You were right before. No one is coming to save me."
"Yeah."
"One problem, though."
"Yeah?"
"We're lying on a hatch."
That was how I sent him to Hell, too fast to get a look at his face. "Express delivery," was how Jayne put it.
"There was just nuthin' left of him, Cap'n."
"It did the same to all of us, Kay, my sweet, sun-dappled soul. Somes just couldn't find a use for it. Somes never cared to."
His back was turned but I could tell he went far-away when he said this.
Oh Captain, I never really understood what you fought your way out of. Not 'til now.
My Captain.
Under the harvest moon,
When the soft silver
Drips shimmering
Over garden nights,
Death, the gray mocker,
Comes and whispers to you
As a beautiful friend
Who remembers.
Under the summer roses
When the flagrant crimson
Lurks in the dusk
Of the wild red leaves,
Love, with little hands,
Comes and touches you
With a thousand memories,
And asks you
Beautiful, unanswerable questions.
- Carl Sandburg, Under A Harvest Moon
(someday #16)
"To those human beings in whom I have a stake I wish suffering, being forsaken, sickness, maltreatment, humiliation - I wish that that profound self-contempt, the torture of mistrust of oneself, and the misery of him who is overcome, not remain unknown to them: I have no pity for them because I wish them the only thing which can prove today whether one has worth or not - that one holds out." - Nietzche
The moment is all we will ever have. That is the first thing they teach you at the Academy. Yet the best of us live life as if it were a dream. If we are truly defined by what no one else can touch, then the best of us are nothing at all. This is what Serenity has taught me. I'll never leave her again. Never.
We were taught to keep a single shining pearl always spinning in our minds. Once we learned to do this with ease we were taught to think of the pearl as ourselves. It helps prevent attachments. i was very grateful for it, once. They don't tell you how easily it becomes an anchor that pulls everything beautiful away.
Another Serenity lesson. The hard one.
Astronomy. Psychology. Politics. Art. History. Art history. Kundaluni yoga. Philosophy. Music, playing and theory. Languages including Latin, Greek, French, Arabic, Russian, Japanese, Swedish. Mandarian and Cantonese, of course, along with several other dialects. Sewing. Etiquette. Engineering. Firearms. Paleontology (my favorite). Agronomy. Animal husbandry. Fencing. Literature. Pottery making. Oratory. Dancing (oh, how the great festival dances thrilled my young heart). Fortune telling (sigh). Biology. Piloting various classes of ships. Physics, quantum and Newtonian. Calculus. Chemistry. Tai chi. Design and architecture. Chess. Massage in many styles. And, yes, even macrame. (Blech.)
Needless to say, there wasn't a lot of free time around the Academy.
River sings as she flies. The two things have become nearly inseparable to her. As she and Jayne are inseparable. At the moment she seemed fixated on a song called "The Dark Don't Hide it." I think it is her own. I asked her if it was and I'm not sure she understood the question. She'd only say it belonged to all of us, myself especially.
It scares me that Jayne seemed to know what she meant by that. Well, he looked at me knowingly and grunted. Deeply unsettling, yet I really don't mind, mostly because i never thought i'd live to see the day a man like Jayne Cobb could ache for a woman the way that boy pines and yearns for her. It's all over his face. She calls him "baby doll." When they make love she's been known to dent the walls with him. He calls her "sugar." His eight knuckles spell out River Tam.
"And they told you you were designed, born this way?"
"Yes."
"They lied."
"WHAT?!"
"Look here. See that? Scarring tissue. Your ovaries were removed."
Removed. Taken. Stolen.
Someone is going to die for this.
It feels like white-hot claws are ripping my insides, trying to get out. How many nights have I fallen asleep thinking of myself as a warm-blooded plaything? The costliest of toys? How many? Someone is going to die screaming for this. I'm going to smear their hot blood across my face. I'm going to tear their shrieking ghosts to shreds.
No. This is not the way. Breathe. Breathe. Fuuuuuuccckkk.
Anger solves nothing. Hatred distracts. Resolve. Will. That is what is required here. Find the crooked road, the true way through. I know it's there. I can feel it. Think it through. No. no. No. Breathe. Hang on. Noo. Fiiight.
Mal went insane when I told him. And Zoe? I shouldn't want to be the thing that stands in her way.
The Temple sentry was very apathetic for a sentry. Jayne was quite amused. Mal christened him the God of half-assery. He knew who River was right off. I should have anticipated that. Of course he would know. He got down on his knees and begged her - begged her - not to rip out his spine and beat him with it. Even I had to laugh a little because of his lisp and his operatic throes. River's response to all this wailing?
"Got any chocolate?"
Oh, for a .wav of his face. He froze there for barely a bip and then proceeded to furiously pat himself down. I think he was about to give himself a cavity search when she reached out, calmed him and took a Quasar Bar from his chest pocket.
"How 'bout beer? Beer is good too," added Jayne.
"Well?"
"Umm. Not on me. But I do have the key to the wine cellar." The shiny brass thing was suddenly there in front of him.
"Done," she said, taking the key and patting him on the head. Then she leaned over and said in a loud whisper, "You should change your pants. You smell bad."
"Okay."
"Jayne, go with him."
"Gotcha, Mal. Be good, sugar."
"Be bad as you wanna be, baby doll."
Then they tongue-kissed for a ridiculous while and she slapped his behind hard as he walked away.
"These are viable, Inara."
"What? What does that mean?"
"It means they could be fertilized. Today. Right now."
"ohmygodohmygodohmygodohmy. . . "
"Captain, you might want to see to your woman."
"I'm right there with her, doc."
"Okay, then. Drop your pants."
"Huh. Okay."
"Not right there. Stop. Here, take this. . .coffee cup and go behind that screen. And hurry. The AM inseminator shift will be along shortly."
"So no pressure then."
"Absolutely none whatsoever."
"Only one chance, a single shot, so to speak, to make my love's dream come true. To help her become what she never thought she could have."
"Like I said. No pressure."
"Mal. . ."
"Don't sweat it two seconds, Inara. I got this."
"Can I help?"
"Noooo. No. I think tidiness is what is required here. Ahem."
"Okay. Mal?"
"I love you very much."
"And don't you ever forget it."
We won't know for a few days if the procedure worked or not. Even if it didn't, knowing the eggs are there and safe is a great comfort. What else they've been doing is another matter that will be taken up in due course. Of that you can be certain.
Maybe someday, someday soon, I can walk through the front doors of the Academy and claim all that is mine. Won't Mal be surprised? Until then, I am content.
I have Serenity.
"A poet? That's easy. A poet is simply a person who knows what the sun's about when the lights go out. Duh." - River Tam
(someday #17)
Fear is not a force of Nature. Fear is the force of nature." - Shan Yu
Book has a son and his name is Malcolm. A son who has a thirty-ought double-barrel Kaiser about three feet from the back of my head and just out of my reach. Smart boy. But I can tell from the sound of the slide track that it ain't been oiled in a good long while. Might backfire. They are known for it. Might be worth the risk. Stupid, child.
It blows to high hell in his hands. Good thing for him he was wearing gear. He looks twenty-five or so. Can't hardly tell cuz of all the screaming and thrashing about. I give him a shot from my Simonvest to take the edge off and he calms right down, thanks me even. At least he's got manners. Seems he also got a half-story about his father's demise. Typical for out here.
I let Wash die. i could have saved him. I should have saved him. No one can tell me different. I should have been faster. He counted on me and now he's gone. No more Tuesdays. For a long while I was gettin' eaten alive by the 'what ifs' of the thing. This wasn't war. It was so much worse. I wasn't ready for how much worse love makes things. How final, vast and empty. I feel like I been stripped clean to the bone. I was afraid I was going to be stuck in that moment for the rest of my life. Or worse, that that moment was my life. River saved me. Showed me so much. Pointed me home, starting with that first treasure she gave me, a dancing leaf. It hangs over my cot and always will.
"There have always been more artists than the world could afford," she said to me in passing just before it all started like this -
My necklace. My leather necklace, I've been wearing it around my wrist. He used to enjoy putting it on me in the morning and taking it off at night. Could be quite insistent about it upon occasion. It started out as practical cuz the catch truly is tricky but it became so much more. The calm of his touch. His spirit. Oh God.
Every night I see him in my dreams. Dead crows are plucking at his eyes.
They were beginning to feel as much a part of me as my hair, my past. River's helped me plenty but I'm still not ready. Not for all the tomorrows and tomorrows and tomorrows. Not for life. Not for anything. And, gorram, don't those choking crows know it.
I used to think I understood the slow unwinding that awaited me. I thought enough was enough. Then I saw Mal get sucked out the shuttle hatch at thirty thousand feet and then I watched River unbuckle, snap her fingers and fly out after him, without a parachute. Jayne would've followed right after her if I hadn't locked him in. She brought him down. Still not sure how. Mal doesn't remember.
Book's son Mal imagines himself something of a pirate king. His people do seem to adore him. But he lacks. He lacks plenty. He's got something cold to prove and yet he allows himself to get carried away. That never ends well. He's a threat, no doubt about it. But, Lordy, can the man talk. Beautiful, beautiful words. Honey and sweet cream. He really does make you see beyond the far horizon. Plus? He's refers to Badger as a "swag-wavin' man-hag." That one had Jayne on the floor.
I got sloppy. Let my guard down and paid for it. Seems my Mal wouldn't bend on some point of business or other. Book's Mal's response was triple-chinned goons stomping me near to death. Honestly, I was relieved. Before we got down to it I told him his father had joy in his heart and brains in his head but he seemed under the impression circling the drain made for a waltz. That angered him up some, drew him in. Then I spit in his mouth.
When I started coming out of it everything was swirling, thick colors and tinny, far-away sounds. I panicked for a second until I realized there were bandages over both my eyes. I started to feel for my wrist but before I could a strong hand gently grabbed mine and put the necklace in my grasp, caressing my forearm. Jayne. Jayne?!
"Stop right there. What are you doing? How did you get in here?
"Me? I am a morning breeze, bad Mal. Nothing more. I am the secret whispered in the deepest dark. You? You have a pretty tongue. I brought scissors."
I was sucking on ice in the med bay when River entered and handed me something wrapped in plain paper. For a second I thought it was his willy. I thanked her and tossed the prize to Junior, who feasted merrily.
"Did you actually do anything to his pecker?"
"Oh, I ate that on the way here. Kinda chewy. . .Kidding. I'm kidding, baby doll. Sheesh." Jayne didn't seem to find that pause funny at all. He went ashen, sort of wobbled sideways, clutched his heart, swatted at the air and then fell back into a chair. It made me laugh out loud for the first time in a long while. And it made me realize a single, burning truth I've been waiting so long to hear.
I'm ready.
"In our estimates, let us take a lesson from kings. The (importance) of hospitality, the connection of families, the impressiveness of death, and a thousand other things, royalty makes its own estimate of, and a royal mind will. To make habitually a new estimate, - that is elevation." - Ralph Waldo Emerson
(someday #1)
"When I am a veteran with only one eye / I shall do nothing but look at the sky." - W.H. Auden
River and I were strolling along a bazaar on Alyson. A beautiful something morning. Not a care in the world.
"That man over there has come to kill you."
"What? What did I. . .which man?"
"That one. The one with the flamingo on a leash."
"I just got here."
"He has two blasters and he's shaky."
"Great. Anything else?"
"Daddy issues. Lots and lots."
"No kidding."
So I walked up to the guy. Didn't want to spend such a lovely day looking over my shoulder. The second he looked me in the eye I knew River was right, not that I doubted but you gotta be sure sure. He tried acting it off but even I could tell he was squirming with hard purpose.
"Can we talk about. . ."
That's when he panicked and pulled so I shot him in the face. I turned to the folks in the area, the ones not running. "Self-defense. Cams will show. Anybody got a problem with that?" I asked. Well, this fool musta been local or connected or he won some kinda dirt-eater popularity contest cuz I was surprised that some did seem to care. Care quite a lot. I steadied my breath and scanned for a leader to take out first. Then River cleared her throat and they all just froze as they noticed her peeking out from behind me, sucking on an ice planet. She gave them a little wave. They exchanged looks and mumbles. A chorus of "no"s and "no problem"s came out as they eased up and shuffled off. I turned around to face her with a big grin slapped on my face and talked to her through clenched teeth.
"Listen, darling, it's not that I don't appreciate your help, cuz I will never stop being grateful for you but you gotta throw me a bone here."
"I go where you go."
"I get that. But you have to understand. . ."
"I go where you go. Two steps to the rear and one to the left."
"Sigh. You're not going to give me anything here, are you?"
She hopped up on a crate and gave me a sugary peck on the cheek.
"I love my Captain."
"There's love and there's work and then there's lover's work."
"You're telling me?"
"Good point. Solid point. Feelin' like some of that 'there there'?"
"Hmm. Let me think abou. . .yeah, okay."
"Ahh. Work. Work. Work."
"And what happened to him?"
"Combine accident few months after I was born. Storms come up quick on Shadow."
"I'm so sorry."
"Yeah, me too. Thanks. It's okay now. I gotta tell ya though, I woulda like to shake his hand once."
You can't treat a horse the way you'd treat most people. You can trust a horse. And I guarantee they don't give a damn who you think you are.
Inara is getting set to pop. A girl. A daughter. I'm about to be a father. Dad. Huh. God, I hope she looks like her mother. C'mon Lord. You owe me big time. And now comes the news that Kaylee and River are expecting as well. And just when poor Kay was beginning to get heartsick about it. She kicked and cursed herself for all those hours in unshielded engine rooms. The weird part? They're both due on the same day. Jayne's birthday bash is to blame, I suspect. Things did get a little out of hand. (Still not sure where that goat came from.) Boy, am I looking forward to that big day. And poor Simon. His eyes are already starting to glaze over from the word 'responsibilities' flashing before them and it's still eight months away.
Doc and I were chatting while he examined Kaylee's stomach. She was drawing flowers on her belly. She was much larger than River and it hadn't been that long. He was listening to her stomach when he seemed to hear something curious. Kaylee sensed it immediately. Simon got curious and distracted. Kaylee was chewing bullets but never said a word. You could tell, though, from the look on her face that she was sure it was cancer. Super-cancer.
"So we're going to need another incubator. Two on board, just in case. . .just in case we can't be near an i. . .c. . .icy. . ."
"One more incubator. Check, doc. But ya gotta understand. One this nice was pure luck. I'll put out feels but it's not the common order in our work. Might take some. . ."
"Three incubators. SHHH."
". . .doing. Three incubators?"
"Yes, three. Here he brushed the hair from Kaylee's face and put the stethoscope on her. "See, I told you. You are just too full of life to be stopped, my sweet, sweet girl. . . Listen. Twins."
That was the moment. The moment that look - oh, that look - burst out of that sweet soul. The moment I could hear my daughter cooing behind me. The moment I could smell my wife (she smells of magnolia and old books), hear the rustle of her kimono. OH. My. That was the moment something twanged deep inside me. God was alright again.
I was alive again.
"Then what is good? The obsessive interest in human affairs, plus a certain amount of compassion and moral conviction, that first made the experience of living something that must be translated into pigment or bodily movement or poetry or prose or anything that is dynamic and expressive - that's what's good for you if you are at all serious in your aims. William Saroyan wrote a great play on this theme, that purity of heart is the one success worth having. "In the time of your life - live!" That time is short and it does not return again. It is slipping away while I write this and while you read it, and the monosyllable of the Clock is Loss, Loss, Loss, unless you devote your heart to its opposition." - Tennessee Williams
(somedays pies are squared)
They stopped at the crest of the hill and turned to give a last wave. Inara led on a fine black mare. Mal followed on an wise old quarterhorse, sharing the saddle with their daughter, Grace, who waved hardest of all. The oranges and purples of the sunset played all over them and made me wistful. Then they turned back, topped the rise and disappeared into dream. What was it Daddy Tam used to say? Oh yeah.
"They lived happily ever after." I like the sound of that.
All together now. . .
(someday zero)
Even here, I am. . . a leaf upon the wind.
**:-)
THE END
COMING SOON - "SOMEDAYS, PT. II - ADOBE SPOONS (THE K = S log W BLUES)"
Until then, here's a taste:
"Einstein said the problem of the now worried him seriously. He explained that the experience of the now means special to man, something essentially different from the past and the future, but that this important difference does not and can not occur within physics. That this experience cannot be grasped by science seemed to him a matter of painful but inevitable resignation." - Rudolf Carnap
It's the freest I've ever been. Weightless, still, serene, reborn even . . . Annnd plummeting planetward at a hasty clip. What else was there to do? The thing had been decided. I felt relief. No one had bought me. No man broke me. It was enough. I even tipped my hat to the Fat Monkey for letting me go out flying, sort of. So much pain. So much beauty. No one gets it right. Inara was the extent of my regret. I have no other thoughts but the rising sun on my face.
That's when River tapped me on the shoulder, gave me the cutest little wave.
She would later explain that the thermal variances in Ochwat's atmo due to the cracked and split mantle, probably from incompetent terraforming, helped to create massive but hyper-localized super cells (tornadoes to you and me). Some several per cubic mile. Basically the shuttle got cut in half by the shear from a wicked updraft but all we lost was the door. Sounded like the queen mother of all trains.
I was so happy to see her for half a second. She looked so cute there in the orange and purple light. Inara's blue and gold silk flapping wildly around her. No shoes. Then it hit me. No parachute. She's dead too.
"We're going to be fine. Take my hand," she yelled. The second I locked wrists with her she angled us down, took us faster and directly toward the largest vortex in sight.
Now you can call me a grav-addled half-wit for saying this, I won't squawk, but damn it all if that girl don't have style.
"The flags are still. No wind blows. it is the hearts of men that are in tumult." - Buddhist saying
"It ain't nobody's fault. That's the point, ya googly-eyed idjit."
It was Jayne's first sermon and and things were starting to go about as you would expect. His flock was the crew of a sister Firefly, the Amores Perroes. Captain couldn't be a nicer fella, Stormy Leftwich. Yup, a sweeter guy is not to be found. Especially for a one-armed, one-legged, one-eyed skip miner. He says the Left Hand War Path showed him some things. Hard to argue.
Jayne had read well, believe it or not. Slow, sure, but without bumble, tremble or waver. Simon stood there with a piece of flatbread half-way to his mouth for quite a while.
I'd have bet Jayne woulda chose to read on the conversion of Saul or one of the righteous slaughterers. I'm told it was from The Song of Songs. Felt vaguely familiar.
River sat at his feet, one knee pulled tight to her body. Actually, from where most the intended flock were sitting her constant nodding and close position to Jayne suggested an act slightly less than sacred. Got a few giggles, which normally would have been a huge mistake. But I was impressed. He let it go. Praise Mazu. But she turned her head and cracked knuckles until they grew attentive. It took two knuckles. Still, the table was set. This was, after all, a man who once ate six pounds of seed corn on a bet (best two credits I ever spent). This was a man who urinated on fresh graves for fun.
It was the cheese that did it. Or whatever it might have been, the snap happened fast. I went looking for my chessboard and when I came back - not two minutes later - there were groaning bodies strewn everywhere. I step on a few teeth and dark rubies of splatter. "Damn. So much for St. Jayne," I think to myself. River is nowhere to be seen. Jayne is squatting in a corner, tears streaming down his face. In his hands he clutches the broken body of a kitten he had stepped on during the melee. Without my asking, he tells me the crunch broke him in half. I don't respond but something cold occurs to me.