"River, Author" Chapter 3
By Abby
Comments: Sorry for the long update. A lot of stuff is happening in RL, and I lost a bit of my momentum. Oh, as for some comments that I got for my last chapter: I am aware that I am a bit light on the slang language and written accents. I do that on purpose. I personally can't stand reading fics that attempt a botched version of some accent, and I wanted to make sure people focused on the words of the person instead of how they said it. Feel free to correct me if you want.
Anyways, enjoy!
OOOO
It was another night of wandering. Malcolm had said goodnight to Jayne two hours ago. As much as he enjoyed the company of his shipmates, gathered around the kitchen table, he craved the moments of solitude he gained in the deep night. He sat on the steps to the abandoned shuttle, staring into the obscurity of the cargo bay.
He thought about the words that he shared with Simon earlier. He wasn't quite sure whether or not to take caution what with the look that he saw in the doctor's eyes. River was a member of the crew, and was turning into a sort of friend to Malcolm, albeit a quiet one. She would always sit in the second chair as he took the pilot's seat, watching silently and observing, occasionally correcting his course to save them a few miles. She had not spoken much since they left Miranda. What she was pondering that kept her mouth closed, Malcolm wanted to know.
As if on cue, a flutter caught the corner of his eye. The hem of a dress floated around the corner. The fairy in question. His eyes stayed trained on the spot, expecting her to come back around, appear in his vision. She didn't. He sat disappointed for a second, then, before he was able to realize it, he was following after her, pulled along mindlessly on invisible strings.
They led him to the cockpit, where his personal Daphne was sitting. Her pale skin and white dress glowed compared to the positively unworthy state of her surroundings. A nymph indeed. Her head was bowed, intently focused on the scribblings she was making in her little blue book. As Malcolm watched her, it occurred to him that she knew he was there. She knew how to be invisible. It was by design that he caught her.
Since she didn't show any sign of giving him attention, he wandered to the front steps, perching himself so he could see the stars clearly but still keep her in his peripheral. It was his intention to sit there until something happened, until she indicated that she wanted to initiate conversation. He crossed his arms and pretended as if he was minding his own business, all the while thoughts buzzing across the back of his mind.
It was nice, having company in the middle of the night. True, she wasn't even paying attention to him, but it was comforting to know someone else was there, someone whom he felt shared the connection of being disconnected. That is, disconnected from the harmony of the 'verse, that glimmer of something that was in everybody else's eye but his. He knew that she understood his world-weariness, even though she never said it.
A page in the journal was turned, and the sound woke the captain up from his musings. He turned towards her, watching her slight little hand furiously race across the page, leaving a trail of neatly printed words, so small that he couldn't make them out from where he was. His curiosity urged him to lean forward so he could read, but he knew that to do so would be a dangerous move. If she chose to confide in him, he would have to wait until then.
Yup, just wait.
Wait until…
Daigua, to hell with it.
"What are you up to, little one?"
River looked up slowly and turned her expressionless face to meet his. Behind the strands of black hair he could see her scrutinizing him, probably trying to decide whether or not she should answer him truthfully. Her mouth twisted upwards for a few seconds in what he had come to recognize as the antecedent to mischief. She went back to writing. "You have trouble sleeping." She said matter of factly.
Ai ya, she was changing the subject on him! He straightened himself up, trying the erase the stupid look he knew was on his face. "Well," he said, trying to think of what to say in response. "So do you."
Her face didn't rotate, but suddenly she had him in her sight, looking at him from the corner of her eye. A smirk appeared on her lips. Her tone was sad, but there was a tinge of sarcasm in it. "I've got 'demons,' captain." She looked back at the page she just finished, lightly tracing the letters with her fingers. "What about you?"
"You could say that…" Malcolm replied, leaning his head back against the railing and gazing back out at the stars. "Just so happens that my mind comes alive at night, all a whirr of things that don't cross my mind when I'm thinkin' about the next job." An uninhabited moon twinkled green to his left, and he twisted himself away further to observe its radiance. "I think 'bout the war, 'bout my place in things, 'bout faith and things Shepherd used to say…" He paused, lost in a small moment of grief.
"Wonderins', that's all."
All was quiet behind him. It suddenly occurred to him that she had easily turned the conversation on himself, and now instead of River exposing her soul, he was now exposing his. He waited for a response, a word, or even the sound of the pen on paper once again. But nothing. He looked at the pilot's chair, not entirely surprised that she had slipped out of the room without him hearing.
How like her to leave him alone, again with unanswered questions. He had a vague feeling that she was setting the trap for him once more, her errant Apollo. She knew he would attempt to follow, only this time she wouldn't let him find her.
