Two by Two by Two, Part 4a

Motherhood, fatherhood, marriage, infidelity, and jealousy—we've got the makings of a good opera here.

Rating: Please read the rating note on Chapter 1.

This section rated T.


Zoe reclined on the sofa in the common area of Serenity, off the dining room. Pregnancy made her tired. She was not used to tired. She was used to being alert, at attention and ready to back the Captain's move. Who'd have thought that growing a baby was such hard work? So, more often than she'd care to admit, she felt an overwhelming need to sit down—and more than that, to put her feet up, recline, and close her eyes.

Strange to think, although she felt so tired, she also felt stronger than she ever had in her life. The baby growing inside her was a presence. She didn't feel it on a conscious level so much as she knew and felt that the baby was there. Not just 'it', but some one, was inside her belly, Someone who was making his or her presence known in ways that were subtle, but undeniable. To a person who didn't know her, her belly looked just a little fat, but Zoe knew the bulging curve was just another one of the ways that Little Someone signaled his or her presence to mama. Huh. That was something. Mama. She was someone's mama. Mama to somebody yet unborn, but mama just the same. Ooh! Seemed that Little Someone was not so subtle after all. She flipped her eyes open and looked at her belly. Someone not Zoe was moving her belly around. 喂 Wèi! there it was again. And this time she saw it. A little bubble that felt like belly gas, but not originating from within her own body—a bubble made by Someone else. She watched the little bump wiggle up and down. Someone was inside her. Bubble, bubble. Little Someone was kicking.

Baby was kicking.

Strongest she'd felt since Wash died, she thought, lying flaccidly on the sofa. Wash would never see his child, but his baby gave her strength—and thus Wash gave her strength, the strength to go on, to continue, to struggle, to live—and to love. A tender smile spread across Zoe's face as she listened to her body and felt in concert with the little one wiggling inside her. It was an unusual look for Zoe, whose friends mostly saw her face of stoic calm, and whose enemies saw a face of lethal intensity. Few people besides Wash were even acquainted with Zoe's tender face. Tenderness was not weakness. Not in any mother. And especially not in Zoe. Tenderness was strength.

As Mal passed through Serenity's dining room, he glanced over to see Zoe stretched out on the sofa in the common area. That in and of itself was an unusual sight, as Zoe weren't one to be lounging around in the broad daylight—well, okay, 's always dark in space, but it was mid-afternoon ship's time. What stopped him in his tracks was the look on Zoe's face. It was dreamy and focused at the same time, tender and loving and strong. Blissful beyond imagination. He'd not seen Zoe look that way in all the days he'd known her, not even that time some years back that he'd stumbled onto the bridge inopportunely, to find Zoe and Wash—best not go there. Anyways, what was goin' on here was clearly something different, so he walked a bit closer, giving notice he was there and letting Zoe make the call as to whether or not his presence was welcome.

She looked over and beckoned Mal to approach. "Captain. Mal."

She almost never used his name, and he looked at her with some surprise as she took his hand and placed it on her belly. He knelt down by the side of the sofa, with Zoe holding his hand on her belly, held his breath, and waited. With a jolt of surprise he felt it. What the good gorram was that?

"Mal, you feel it?" Zoe asked.

He surely did. The baby. Zoe's baby. He closed his eyes, held his breath, and waited—longer this time. A little bubble of movement. He lowered his head to Zoe's belly, placing his ear and cheek right against her skin and looking up into Zoe's face. Felt like little burbles. Quiet-like for a spell. Then another little twitchy. Didn't know what his face was expressing toward Zoe, but what he felt was a fascinated wonderment, almost holy in its intensity. Zoe…life. Zoe creating life. Zoe. Life. He felt a little jab at his cheekbone. Kid had just kicked him in the jaw, most like. He gave a little laugh, reached up, and cradled Zoe's face in his hands. He bent over and kissed her. "You done good, Zoe," he said softly. "Got yourself a little fighter in there."

. . .

Inara glided softly into the dining room, seeking a soothing cup of her favorite tea. Someone was in the common area, and she glanced over. What she saw stunned her, and only her Companion training saved her from betraying her shock. Mal was kneeling next to Zoe, with his face pressed into her bare belly. What was going on? The two of them were so wrapped up in each other that they were completely oblivious to her. She couldn't quite read the expression on his face as he gazed up Zoe's shapely body into her face, but love was undoubtedly a large component of his look. As she stood transfixed, he laughed softly, tenderly placed his hands on Zoe's face, and kissed her. Kissed her! He murmured sweet nothings. Inara could bear it no more. Turning, she quietly fled to the shelter of her shuttle.

Mal and Zoe! Zoe and Mal! How had she never seen it? All that not-touching they did in public. Zoe calling him 'sir' like she didn't even know his first name. Those intense dialogs they had with just their eyes. Everyone knew Zoe and Mal were close, but she'd always bought the line they fed the others that they were not a couple, never were a couple. Just war buddies. And she'd felt sorry for Mal—sorry for him!—that he'd spent so many years alone, deprived of feminine caresses, feeling no womanly touch. Arrgh! She could just scream. How had Wash put up with this 狗屎 gǒushǐ?

Wash. Oh, poor Wash. She knew he'd felt jealous of Mal and Zoe's closeness. They went off together on jobs, and returned with the stories. The stories of thrilling heroics, adventure and bonding. It was always a "job" that took them off by themselves, and no one else really knew what they did when they were alone together. Of course they'd been discreet aboard the ship. It was a very small community. But both of them had phenomenal powers of restraint—amounting to repression in Mal's case. She'd seen through Mal's attempts at obfuscation and re-direction in other matters, but she had to admit he'd thrown her off the scent in this case, with all his nattering complaints about shipboard relationships. Wash had thought those complaints were directed at him. Oh, poor Wash! Was Zoe's baby even Wash's? Or was it Mal's? "I'm going to be a father for sure." Of course. She felt anger at their betrayal. On Wash's behalf, of course.

Or mostly on Wash's behalf. But some on her own behalf. A lot on her own behalf. Much as she hated to admit it, she felt tremendous anger at Mal for betraying her. Control is the first lesson, and the last. Mal and Zoe! And all this time he'd made such a show of mooning after her! Her, a bona fide Companion! Control is the first lesson. He'd convinced her that he loved her, worked his way into her bed, into her heart. The first. He'd seemed so joyful, so grateful, that she'd allowed him to lie with her. Control is first. So sorrowful, when she shut him out. Oh, the hurt in his eyes when she spoke harshly to him. Control. The jealousy he expressed when she went off to do her business. Jealousy! Zoe and Mal. Traitor!

. . .

Mal was still in a state of complete awe when he went to the bridge to take his watch.

Zoe's baby was real. Kid had just kicked him. There was gonna be a baby on this boat, in just four months' time. Better get used to the feeling.

He knew that, with Wash dead, Zoe was counting on him to stand-in as the child's father. 我的天啊Wǒ de tiān ā. It finally hit him. He was going to be a father. Not biologically, perhaps. A stand-in father. But it was real enough.

"Amazing, isn't it?" Wash said.

"Yeah," Mal responded with overflowing eloquence. He was unable to think of a single thing to say that properly expressed his feelings on the occasion.

"You look like you're in shock. You should sit down."

"I am sitting down," Mal replied.

"Sit down, put your head between your knees…and kiss your freedom from responsibility goodbye."

Mal's face twitched in a half smile. "I already done that, Wash. Long ago. But I ain't the child's father, Wash. You are."

"Of course I am," Wash answered. "But, you know, being dead and all, it'll be hard for me to be much of a 'hands on' kind of father. Funny, my old man was 'hands on' but it was only when he was trying to catch me and my brothers to punish us for 撒赖 sālài."

"What, you? Cause trouble?" Mal responded with a shake of his head. "Can't imagine it."

Wash merely smirked.

"Didn't have nothin' to do with your smart mouth, did it?"

"Well, luckily, you'll make a good stand-in," Wash grinned. "You're almost as much of a smart-mouth as I was, so the kid'll have a good example."

"You're expecting me to stand-in?"

"I'm counting on it. So is Zoe. She can't raise this kid on her own."

"She ain't on her own. Everybody here on this boat is family."

"Yeah, but Jayne?" Wash looked toward the ceiling and shook his head. "I can't have Jayne being the father figure for my child. It's you, Mal."

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glossary

喂 Wèi [Hello!]

狗屎 gǒushǐ [crap]

我的天啊 Wǒ de tiān ā [Dear god in heaven] (literally means "Oh my sky"—I particularly like this phrase for Mal)

撒赖 sālài [raising hell]

A/N: To Inara: Pot, meet kettle. Kettle, meet pot. The baby-is-kicking scene created quite a stir at the other site I post at, and I'd like to know what you thought of it.