Disclaimer : I do not own Firefly or any of the Characters on Serenity , they belong to Fox and Mutant Enemy!  

But hopefully we will all soon be able to own them on DVD ( I can´t wait!)

Notes: Thanks again for all the kind feedback!!

I admit to borrowing this chapter´s title from the british writer Oliver Goldsmith, I just couldn´t resist!

Thanks again to my  wonderful friend Franzy who bears with my OBSESSION and liked my story….

SHE STOOPS TO CONQUER

  They had landed, River could feel it in her sleep. She could also feel Simon´s drugs wearing of ……and she was becoming more and more agitated. There was something …..she could feel it, some kind of impending danger .

 She shook her head.

Not good, not good ….. they were doing the crime thing again. From what she gathered from conversations between the Captain and Zoe they were trying to sell what was left of the medical supplies…....the ones they had stolen when ……

River shook her head again, looking around the room until she found her purple dress.

Guns, she thought, guns were not enough……they needed something else or things would go wrong, terribly wrong!

"No boots…" she whispered to herself, " No boots , too loud……..still as a mouse, light as smoke …."

She needed to be quiet, Simon could not see her or he would stick her again, with his needles and she did not need this now.

River screwed her eyes shut and tried to concentrate…if she could only pierce through all the fog, the thick fog in her mind. The voices were more than a background noise right now, coming and going like the tide, ……louder, than softer. They were whispering

,then yelling about the danger. She needed to do something, there was gonna be blood………so much blood if she didn´t ……….

The frustration brought tears to her eyes.

" I  know.." she whispered to the voices " I understand …please let me go, let me help! I can make things right!"

 But she was still so confused and unsure of what to do. She needed to act on that feeling though…..he could not go like this, guns were not enough!

If only she knew exactly what was going on, but the whole picture was hidden from her view. She never knew all the details, only fragments…….only what might come to pass if the circumstances remained unaltered. She never knew everything, only the different possibilities.

She needed to see him, then it would be alright,….no more confusion, no voices and she might be able to make him see …….at least make him take precautions even though she would not be able to explain why.

River looked around the room once more……..her secret, now where did she put it?

It was as though she could feel the chemicals fading from her metabolism as she suddenly realised that this time it wasn´t the voices that made her so confused, it was the drugs!

There was still something inside her, at the dark place, but this time …..whatever it was, it wasn´t trying to confuse her. It was urging her on, rallying violently …….to see, to understand.

There were different kinds of danger! Different layers to the feeling of impending doom that held her heart in a death grip………and the thing, the loud voice inside of her screamed for her to look into the right direction, to see it coming.

River pressed her hands to her temples.

Not now, not now …….first things first. There was something he needed from her.

River smiled…..and then there was something she needed from him.

Jayne walked along the corridor, checking his gun before he put it into the holster he was wearing around his hips. Suddenly two white, tiny hands grabbed the front of his shirt out of nowhere and pulled him into the empty shuttle he had been passing.

" Ruddin` hell! What the …."

" Can´t go yet…." River hissed, looking around carefully to make sure Inara didn´t notice what was going on right in front of her own shuttle door, before she closed the door behind them.

" River …..are you out of you gorram mind , girl?"

She shot him an ironic look that made Jayne smirk involuntarily.

" Never mind." He added " Watcha doin´? Mal and Zoe are waiting for me in the cargo- bay, I need to go."

River shook her head, pulling a knife out of her purple dress. Jayne didn´t even want to guess where she got it from or where she had been hiding it …….he instinctively stepped back.

River frowned, she was agitated and nervous, he could see it in her face.

It was a long, slim blade and there was no mistaking the deadly gleam……the silvery metal was clean and sharp.

He looked from the blade to her face, not exactly sure what to expect. He did not like this, even though he didn´t think she would try to cut him again.

River felt his tension and shook her head again, angry with herself. But she had this feeling, this bad feeling ….something bad could happen. The voices were whispering again, urgently…..somewhere   one voice rose over all the others, like a high- pitched scream. Using all her strength  River pushed them to the back of her mind. There was something else …something dangerous, but she couldn´t remember.

" Take it!" she demanded, holding the knife out to him.

It was an expensive, beautifully crafted blade, Jayne could tell from just looking at it, more a piece of art than a weapon …..but it would serve it´s purpose, he was sure of that. It looked old, maybe an antique?

" Take it…please." River pleaded.

" Don´t think I´ll…."

" You will need it!" she interrupted him, offering him the knife again.

Jayne carefully took the knife from her hands and put it into his boot with her following every move of his.

When he was done River nodded, a look of relief flooding her features.

It was almost as if he could see the tension falling away from her shoulders.

Now that was better, he thought, she had almost spooked him there….

He gave her a wink and moved to leave the shuttle, but River stood in his way and made no attempt to step aside.

When he stood directly in front of her she looked up, gathering her hair to pull it over her shoulders. Her facial expression had changed…..

" You need to kiss me before you go out there to do …..crime or whatever it is the three of you will be doing. Before you go out onto the planet…..I need you to kiss me before you leave."

She told him in a very authoritative tone of voice.

Jayne stared down at her, a little taken aback.

" What?"

" I need you to …."

" I heard watcha said!"

" Why do you ask then? That makes no sense…." River said confused.

She thought she had made herself very clear …all the words had come out in the right order, the right way……no twisting.

Jayne furrowed his brow. Was she for real? Sometimes she made him feel all kinds of stupid.

" Look" he ground out between his teeth. " River …I have no time for ruddin´ games now….they are waiting for me and we don´t want them start looking, do we?"

" No playing…." River shook her head " If we are ..I don´t know the rules , don´t know the game…"

His breath came out in an exasperated hiss. That gorram girl! She had disarmed him again…..everytime! As though she wanted to outsmart him on purpose …..most likely that was indeed the case. They both knew she was a genius, …..and Jayne didn´t even give in to the illusion that he might one day get the best of her.

" Listen …you ruddin´well know that this is neither the time nor the place for this."

The same time he heard the words come out of his mind he wondered what was wrong with him.

River´s brows knit together again, she did not like this , she was getting impatient. They were stuck again, despite all her efforts! How could this be?

" I know I want you to…that is what makes it right. And I know you want to…..this is how it is done, how it is supposed to be …you kiss the girl before you go.."

" River!" he almost yelled but remembered Inara being not too far away so he forced himself to keep his voice down." We´ve  been over this! I want to …and you ruddin´ well know that I can´t hide it from you! But…."

Now wait a minute…..Jayne suddenly realized that somehow they were not arguing if he wanted to anymore…..they were arguing about whether or not he should comply! How the hell did she do it?

" Why are you acting all stiff again?" River asked angrily.

Jayne shot her a foul look that would have shut up most people, not her though …..he knew that. She was not afraid of him, but did she even know what she was implying there?

Best not go there now….

River sighed and leaned into him, one of her hands moving over his chest…..and all of Jayne´s self- restraint went out the window.

He put a hand in the back of her neck. Leaning down, lifting her mouth to his, he kissed her with all the pent up emotion he had been harbouring since the night in cargo bay. He half expected her to pull away and run scared….but River just slid her hands around his back and opened her mouth to him with a tiny little mewl. He felt the tip of her tongue graze  the line where there lips met. He could feel her tremble though as he put his other hand in the small of her back, locking her body to his.

The sheer force of his embrace almost lifted her of her feet.

River felt him inhale with a sharp hissing sound and his arms tightened around her even more.

It seemed to her that her whole body was singing,that she would be consumed by this feeling…

She could feel his hard body pressed against her, all muscle and sinew and bone, she could feel his muscles move beneath his skin as she slid her hands over his back.

This was good…golden and warm, she felt as though she must be glowing with all the exciting sensations….

An involuntary gasp escaped her as Jayne carefully pushed her away from him, his hands still on her shoulders……wondering if all of  her skin was that soft. He shook his head …get your mind out of the ruddin´ gutter! We are not going there now!

Breathing heavily Jayne looked at her, searching her eyes.

This was something he definitely wanted to remember for the rest of his life. Her standing there, hair all mussed up, her pale skin slightly flushed. She was by far the most exciting thing he had ever seen…..and that was exactly why he needed to leave now …this instant. Not to long ago he would have just given in to his impulses, but he surprised himself by drawing back.

Gorram hell ! That ruddin´girl really did get to him……could it be that he was starting to grow a conscience now?  Or had that process started a while ago and he just hadn´t noticed so far ?

River returned his intense look, realizing what he was thinking. He wanted her…….she tried to surpress a smile. The fuzzy feeling made her light-headed.

" You have to go…" she uttered softly, bringing him back to his senses.

" Go…right." Jayne nodded and moved past her swiftly, but before opening the shuttle door he thought the better of it.

 Maybe she really was a witch ….or a fairy or something along those lines, she surely had enchanted him….that tiny slip of a girl!

He turned around, to caress her cheek, one of his thumbs moved lightly over her lower lip.

River felt the fuzzy feeling spread from her chest, tingling even down to her toes. She closed her eyes and leaned into his touch, it was a gesture of complete and utter surrender,  that only spurred him on.

" Gorramit!" she heard him say under his breath, before he leaned down to capture her lips again in a very slow and seductive kiss.

He had been right, the fact  that he usually didn´t kiss women on their mouths didn´t mean that he wasn´t good at it.

Jayne pondered the same thought, he had rarely felt the need to kiss women this way…maybe once or twice in his life……but her…this girl he wanted to kiss. Really kiss her  and enjoy kissing her, he thought as his lips moved down her jaw-line to her throat.

He could feel her pulse race underneath her smooth skin, feel her hands move through his short hair as she arched her back.

He was beyond amazed, she was all feeling …had she even done this before or did it all come naturally to her?

His hands moved into her soft hair and his kiss grew more passionate. He really needed to get out of here or there was no telling what might happen.

He  didn´t understand what was happening, why he felt the urge to kiss her like this…….half of the time she drove him insane, a few weeks ago he hadn´t even liked her!

And what she saw in him, though she had tried to explain……the devil might know! This…..was most likely wrong, but it felt pretty darn good! She felt so good…..sweet and soft and warm, moving in his arms, breathing….kissing him.

River felt his tongue explore her mouth,….. she wanted  to get even closer to feel more of him.

No…this had to stop now! He needed to stop now, Jayne realized ……after all he was only a man and this ……this would not stop here! If he couldn´t, she sure as hell wouldn´t be the one to put an end to this.

Finally he stepped back, driving his hands through her dark, tangled hair once more. He couldn´t even look at her ….he needed to get out now!

" Gotta go!" he whispered roughly, turning around, almost fleeing the shuttle.

As he made his way to the cargo- bay he hoped and prayed that the others would not be able to see through his stony expression……see how shaken he was.

Focus, gorramit!

He needed to focus, to concentrate on the job at hand…….focus on the upcoming deal.

" Where the hell have you been?" Mal called up to him when he reached the railway.

" We´ve been waiting for you!"

" Forgot my knife!" Jayne answered as grumpily as possible.

" Good to go then…" Zoe said.

" Let´s do it!" Jayne nodded.

Gorramit! Pull it together and focus on the deal!

" You will need it!" he heard her whisper in his mind. He could feel the blade inside his boot, cool  and reassuring.

He shook his head again. He needed to stop,to start acting like his old self……but all he could think about as they left the ship, was to wrap her up in his arms and hold her as tight as possible.