Ghosts & Memories Past Chapter 9

Author: Brandywine00

Rating: T, maybe M later?

Disclaimer: Don't own them, don't make any cashy-money off of them. Joss rules!

Thanks to everyone for the continued interest in this tale, and for the shiny comments and questions! Reviews help me write better (I hope – LOL!) Special thanks to jellie_rayneluv for beta and help with this fic.

Jayne has a secret, buried so deep even he doesn't know…

Chapter Nine – Confronted

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Whitefall, fourth moon of Athens…

Jayne glared up at Mal from the scrubby desert floor, rubbing his jaw. The large hand strayed toward his holster, but halted about halfway.

Mal didn't budge. If Jayne had wanted to, he could easily have killed Mal or left him to his own fate in that cell. Could have turned and shot him anytime while they ran. Mal wasn't a complete fool, despite what Patience may care to think. The man may have secrets, a checkered past and a lot of bad habits, but Mal put his money on what he'd seen of Jayne recently.

"Guess that's been building for a while," Jayne grumbled as he rose deftly to his feet. Still in defensive stance, Mal noted, but not overly aggressive. "Now that you've got it out of your system, I trust it won't happen again."

"Trust," Mal half-laughed. "Funny you should use that word."

Jayne scanned over his face, like the gun hand was searching for something elusive that wasn't quite defined. "I'd say trust has to play a pretty big role here, don't you? Unless, of course, you'd rather head back to the gallows and trust your fate to them?"

The big man half turned and lowered himself onto a large boulder, resting his forearms on his knees as he stared back up at Mal. "I figure we trust each other, or else we both go down. Anyway, I know you trust me."

"That a fact?" Mal challenged, picking out his own rock to drop down on. "How'd you suss out that conclusion?"

"You untied me once you were loose. Wouldn't have given up that advantage if you didn't trust me," Jayne replied easily, ticking off on his long fingers, his cool blue stare never leaving Mal's. "You trusted me to handle the attacker with your back to me as you inspected his partner. You trusted me with a loaded weapon. Which you gave to me. You trusted me determine the time to move from the jail. You trusted me to take the lead into the hills. You trusted me enough not to disable or kill me by shooting me in the back while we were running, which you safely could have once we were far enough away. Am I wrong on any point?"

Mal grunted, making a deal of emptying a rock out of his boot. "Guess when you put it like that, I could see where you'd think I trust you. Still, we got some issues to clear up, me and you, before we go any further."

"I figured we'd get back to that sooner or later," Jayne said, suddenly taking interest in cleaning the dirt from under his nails. "Though I'm not sure how many answers I'll have for you. But I assume with the… history," he said almost questioningly, "between us, I trust you too. Especially since, as stated, you didn't shoot me in the back when you could have."

"I shoot a man, he's facing me," Mal retorted, glaring hard at him. "You oughta know that by now, Jayne."

Gorram if the man didn't laugh, though the sound was bitter.

"You might be surprised at how much, or how little, I know. But I get that about you. You're not the kind to take the cheap shot. The honor in you shows through. I respect that. I just hope –" he hesitated, then huffed out a hard sigh. "I just hope I've earned enough of your respect at some point that you'll listen to what I have to say with an open mind. I give you my word here and now, man to man, that I'll answer your questions to the best of my ability."

He barked out that humorless laugh again. "If I've got anything to hide, I assure you I'm unfortunately not aware of it at the moment."

"What the ruttin' hell do you mean, you're not aware – aw, hell, Jayne, just spit it out, have done with it." Mal felt his patience slipping as his crewman's words worked around in his brain. "I didn't send ya out the airlock after Ariel, did I?"

Jayne stared at him in question.

"No, I ruttin' did not!" he answered himself. "Though at the time, you'd earned it, don't you think?"

The merc rubbed his hands over his face with a sigh. "Maybe it'd be better if we start over. Can you tell me how I came to be in that dungeon?"

"You gotta be kiddin' me… they musta used some real high-powered go se to knock you out, you can't remember gettin' taken down."

Raised brows.

"The gun fight?"

Frown of concentration.

"Deal in town bein' an ambush? Me, you an' Zoë gettin' pinned down by Patience's goons?"

"Zoë?" Jayne looked puzzled and a bit ashamed. "We left someone behind? I thought Zoë was the one who was going to pick us up."

Mal blew a hard sigh. "You got shot by tranqs, I got whacked on the head, Zoë went to take out the sniper who shot you and had us pinned down. I'm guessing she got him, since the only four haulin' us back to Patience didn't include that one. Gorramit, man, you've forgot just about everything but your own name."

That guarded look again. "It's Jayne Cobb. Isn't it?"

"Jay – of course it's Jayne ruttin' Cobb! What the –" Mal stopped short. "You ain't jokin', are ya? You really don't know your own – well, slap me ugly an' call me Badger. Guess ya don't recollect mine neither, do ya?"

He could see Jayne's prominent jaw tic as the big man clenched it hard, a boatload of worry trying to hide behind that stone façade. "Gorramit, Jayne, what'd they do to ya?"

Wide shoulders slumped almost imperceptibly as the big man let out a slow, heavy sigh. "I've got no idea," he said in a low voice. "You called me Jayne. And Cobb, so I pieced together that much. But really, I'm taking a huge chance letting you know… well, that I don't… don't know much of anything right now. And don't know why. Or even if I want to."

Jayne scrubbed his palms down his thighs, sitting up a little straighter and meeting Mal's eyes square and steady. "But I do know, somehow, from what I've seen of you today, that I trust you. Don't know why, but I know it. As sure as I'm sitting here."

Mal sat there stunned for a minute, trying to wrap his brain around the situation. "Huh."

"I know that I know you," Jayne continued with apparent frustration. "Even if I don't know how or why. So… I just have to go on the gut feeling that you'll do right by me. Hope you'll shed a little light on why I woke up hog-tied in a piss-ass jail cell with two inept would-be murderers, and can't remember a damned thing before that."

The captain ran a hand through his dark hair. "I conjure this all ain't from the tranq they hit you with. You ain't right, Jayne. Ain't been right for some while now, though I ain't really caught on to that 'till just recent."

"What do you mean, 'some while'? How long? How long have you known me? I take it we are allies, then?"

"Reckon allies works, though it ain't the best word. It's kinda convoluted, after Miranda and all. You're on my crew, but it's more than a crew after that whole scenario. We're all more like family now."

Jayne seemed to mull that over a moment as he checked the darkening horizon, a growing glow in the east heralding one of Whitefall's sister moons rising. "So who was Miranda?" he asked softly. "Did she die? Were we close?"

"Did she – no, she didn't die! I mean… Miranda weren't a person, she was – it was – it IS a place, gorram it!" Mal pressed his fingers into his temples to ease the pressure growing there. "Miranda is a long story, but it ain't a person, it's a place only all the people there were dead and we found out why and sent a wave that told everyone, and I ain't goin' into the whole battle we had against the Reavers right now. Just… let's just keep it simple for the here and now, can we?"

The gun hand nodded slowly, giving Mal the same look folk gave them what was tetched in the brainpan. He sighed and tried to start over.

"My name, which I gather ya don't recollect neither, is Captain Malcolm Reynolds. You call me Mal. Or Captain."

"I don't call you 'sir'?" Jayne frowned.

"You could call me 'sir' if ya took a notion, which would be a nice change, but ya don't generally. Only Zoë calls me 'sir'. But that's just cause we served together in the War."

"We didn't serve together?"

"You said ya didn't fight in the War."

"That doesn't sound like me."

"Well, how the guay would you know what ya sound like? Didn't even know yer own name 'till…" Mal took a deep breath. "You didn't serve with me in the War."

"So, you're Captain Malcolm Reynolds, who I don't address as an officer because I didn't serve in the military during the War," Jayne said, as if he were trying to memorize the intel.

"Weren't no officer in the War, I was a Sergeant. Zoë was my Corporal."

"But now you're a Captain."

"Right."

"Green and gold?"

"Green and who?"

"I don't know, but the words just popped into my head when you said that, so I figured you'd know."

"Got no ruttin' idea what yer on about with that," Mal broke in. "I was a Sergeant. Now I'm a Captain, but not in the military."

Mal held his hand up to stop the man from interrupting. "Captain of a ship. Serenity. Our home. Yer one of my crew. Hired on a few years back, after ya tracked us down and shot yer old boss, Marco. Don't say a word! Officially, yer the 'public relations' specialist. What that means is anyone what gets fussy not wantin' to pay us for a job, or takes a notion to double-cross us, you 'relate' to them why that ain't such a shiny idea. Generally with Boo or Vera, or sometimes Binky. Or that vicious right of yours."

"I rely on women to fight for me?" He sounded downright affronted at the idea.

"No, dumbass, those are your guns," Mal said patiently. "Boo, which I kindly retrieved offa that fella what was gonna gut ya, along with your knife Binky – an' yer welcome. Vera's your pride an' joy, but that Fed got her. You name all yer guns. Figured outta everything, your 'girls' would spark some rememb'rance."

He forged ahead. "Miranda was a whole screwed up situation, and ain't none of us been the same since then. My own self included, so don't think it's just you. But yer the one, now I been thinkin' on it, seems to have been hit the hardest by it all. Ain't been actin' yerself for months now, Jayne, but I guess I've been too wrapped up in my own brain over what's happened since we lost Wash and Book that I ain't noticed too much."

"We lost a book and a wash?"

Mal bit his lip, his stare growing hard. "Now I know you ain't right. Wash was our pilot. Hoban Washburne. Red-haired fella, liked to make jokes an' wear loud shirts and play with dinosaurs and flew better than any what I ever met. Zoë's husband. Speared through the chest by Reavers after he saved us all with his fancy flyin' skills. Book was… Book was the preacher man."

He halted, shaking his head as he softened a bit. "Now I'm for sure certain you ain't playin' at this, Jayne. You of all folks wouldn't make a joke about Book, him being gone to his rewards. You an' Book were friends. Used to spot each other for liftin' down in the cargo bay. He was… he tried to redeem us all from our wicked ways. Lately, seems like he did all right by you in the tryin'."

They sat in silence as the glowing crescent rose over the distant hills, each deep in his own musings for a while.

"Reckon we oughta try to rest," Mal finally suggested. "Think you can get any shut eye, what with the luxurious accommodations we got ourselves here?"

The large silhouette turned toward him, features barely discernable in the faint moonlight. "I ought to be falling down, as tired as I am," he confessed. "But I've got too much to think on, and I'm pretty sure our captors haven't given up the search yet."

"They did go to a heap of trouble to get us, didn't they? Any idea what the Alliance wants with you?"

"Honestly? Can't say, since I don't know exactly who the Alliance is, or what I may have done to piss them off. What about you? What did our host want you for, besides a lawn ornament?"

"Patience?" Mal laughed. "Oh, Patience and me go back a ways. She's always tryin' to get one up on me, an' I'm tryin' to get what's due me without her makin' me dead. Kinda our little game. Personally, I think the ol' lady's sweet on me."

He could see Jayne's frown by the moonshine. "Did she shoot you before?"

Mal grimaced. "Man can't remember his own name or why he's bein' chased by the gorram Allicance or nearly bein' killed by Reavers or anything about his own ruttin' life. But let a little ol' lady shoot a fella one time, an' folks just keep bringin' it up over an' over!"

He picked out a fairly level spot next to a slight overhang of the rocks and laid down, arm under his head. "I'm gonna rest up a bit. Wake me if ya see or hear anything, dong ma?

"Affirmative," the answer came back. He'd nearly slipped into a light sleep when he heard the faint musing… "But she did shoot you, didn't she."

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