A/N: Thanks to my mom, who's an RN, for medical advice. Any errors are my fault. ;)


CHAPTER SIX

The next time River opened her eyes, her mind was a lot clearer. The first time, seeing Mal's face hovering above hers, had felt very dreamlike. It took her eyes a moment to adjust; it was nighttime and very dark in the room. One thing that had not changed was Mal's presence. He was asleep, slouched in a chair beside her bed, looking quite uncomfortable. She watched him for a long moment, assessing her body and the entire situation. Her back felt numb—no doubt due to a local anesthetic of some sort—and the IV was still running into her arm, but the tube was no longer in her nose.

She had a dozen questions that she wanted answered. Obviously, her cover had been blown. Again. And Mal had met the feds—he had mentioned them before she passed out last time, and she had seen it in his mind. He had questioned their word, but he hadn't hesitated in coming. He'd just come very, very cautiously, fearing it was just a trap in which River had been caught. He'd had Jayne hidden as back-up, but he hadn't needed it, because for once, the Alliance had been truthful with him.

"Mal." Her voice sounded hoarse to her own ears, and she cleared her throat to try again, but Mal's eyes had already snapped open, and he quickly leaned forward.

"Hey. How you feelin'?"

"All right. Mal…" Something had changed. Despite everything going on, despite everything River knew needed to be done, she couldn't help but notice that something in Mal's eyes was different—just the way he looked at her. She swallowed a sudden lump in her throat, and focused on business. There would be time for other things later. "Where is Sarah Elliot?"

"That Agent Burnham's got her and her kids on their boat, or so she says. Got all mighty determined to keep her safe, just on your word. I'm thinkin' it sounds the truth, first 'cause you didn't do no protestin' when I mentioned them last time you came round, and second 'cause her team ain't taken off—she's got one fed sitting here at the med-center waitin' on you."

"They're all right," River said. "The feds. They didn't lie to me about their investigation. They wanted my help."

"River, who is Sarah Elliot?"

River closed her eyes, her mind swarming with all of the memories she had seen, memories that weren't hers—memories from Sarah Elliot and Rina Duncan, mixing together and filling in the pieces of each other's knowledge. "She's a rancher. Her husband—Mal, she thought her husband was just a legitimate tradesman, but he got into an armload of debt and didn't tell Sarah. Debtors were going to claim the ranch, the ranch her daddy left her." Talking was making River very tired, and she closed her eyes for a moment.

"So he got into slavin' to pay off the debt."

River opened her eyes and nodded slightly. "Yes. He didn't realize everything he was getting into. He wanted to get out. He found out about Rina Duncan, found out what she's doing. He got evidence. Proof to show the 'verse. He was murdered for it, killed by others, but the evidence was missing."

"What evidence?"

"I don't know. I didn't see that. Rina Duncan knew, but I didn't see. She's been trying to track it down. Not just for her, for the Alliance." River felt a twinge start in her back—the medicine seemed to be wearing off. "Too much," she managed. She took a deep breath. "She sent other slavers who had worked with Ollie—Sarah's husband—to her house last week, looking for the evidence. She thought maybe Ollie had sent it home. But Sarah didn't know. Didn't know anything. They took Savannah from her."

"Who's Savannah?" Mal asked quietly.

River blinked against the image of a bright-eyed, freckle-faced little girl. "Her daughter."

"So they took her daughter for what? Blackmail?"

"Yes." River looked Mal in the eye. "I know what Rina Duncan has been doing, and why." Her back was really starting to ache now, but she pressed on, needing Mal to know this. Needing someone besides her to know. "The Alliance has had a hard time maintaining control of the border worlds in the past few years."

"That, we know," Mal said. "Shot themselves in the foot one too many times."

"There are some very powerful people out on these border worlds—they need people to do the work. There's a lot of dangerous work out here. There are a lot of things to make you sick. Hard labor."

Mal's eyes narrowed, catching onto the idea. "Slaves."

"Slaves," River agreed. "They wanted slaves, because they couldn't afford all the workers. Some worlds, they can get away with it. They can just pay the bare minimum to workers, or nothing at all, because no one looks too closely. But some worlds…can't. Doesn't succeed, or too much trouble."

"Let me guess. Rina Duncan made things go smooth, bein' that she coordinates shippin' between worlds."

"Yes. In exchange for cooperation and control of some of the border worlds. It keeps them under the Alliance's thumb. I just can't prove it. Ollie Elliot…maybe he knew someone was after him. He had to have put the proof somewhere. Somewhere that someone could find it. Duncan was positive it had to be with Sarah."

"We'll worry on that once you're better," Mal said, eyes narrowing as he noticed her sudden wince. "You hurtin'?"

"A little," River admitted. "Feels like I got shot in the back."

"Funny," Mal said dryly. He stood up and stretched. "I'll get them doctors to give you somethin' for it."

The doctor did give her something for it, and something to make her sleep. She protested that. "I just woke up!" but the doctor told her, "Rest makes for faster recovery time. Sleep is good on the body."

"You sound like my brother," River grumbled, and she saw Mal suppress a smile.

"Then your brother is a very smart man," the doctor told her as he injected her IV with medicine.

River was out before she had time to answer him.

:-:-:

Despite River's assurances that the feds were on their side, Mal didn't think he was going to ever trust them. However, when Burnham came back to the med-center and got around to asking the questions he'd known were coming, he considered her very carefully. "You got a seriously screwed up government."

"Some of it," Burnham admitted. "Though I suppose you and your crew have seen more of that side than anything else." She pursed her lips. "Sarah Elliot has been asking questions, and I honestly have no idea what to tell her. I have no idea why she and her children are on my ship, Captain, or who she was meeting with that day, though you certainly seem to know. I got absolutely nowhere in my questioning of the shooter, and I just got a message that he's dead. Poisoned, by the look of it, which means that someone got to him."

Rina Duncan, no doubt. Who knew how many people here she had under her thumb? It took one cold-hearted hun dan to go around ordering all these deaths, including that of her own bodyguard, if she was truly responsible.

After a long moment, Mal finally decided to give her something, least till he could think it over some more. Really, her own cover and that of her agents had been compromised because she'd chosen to help River. "I hope you got your ship locked up tight—and I wouldn't put it past these people to try somethin' to your boat."

"Trust me, we've already considered that. We're orbiting this moon—I figure it's safer in the air." Burnham stared hard at Mal. "I would ask River these questions, obviously, but she isn't doing much talking just now." She seemed to struggle with herself, and then sighed. "I'm at a dead end, Captain Reynolds. Anything you could tell me would be a great help."

Humility from a fed. Who woulda thunk it? "Seems Sarah Elliot's husband was a slaver," Mal finally said, figuring this much couldn't hurt. "But she still don't know it. Got himself into trouble with some people who wanted to keep him quiet about their parts in this slave ring—like one of your politicians. Did Sarah tell you her daughter was kidnapped?"

"Yes. She said she was meeting someone—" Understanding dawned on Burnham's face. "She met with the kidnapper?"

"In a fashion. Your politician's lookin' for some sort of evidence Sarah's husband seems to have hid. Thought she must have it."

"Wang ba dan de biao zi," Burnham cursed, and despite himself, Mal almost smiled. For half a second there, she'd sounded like a normal human being. "Which politician?"

Before Mal could decide if it was in his best interest to answer that, Burnham held up a finger and pressed her finger to the transceiver in her ear. "Go ahead." She listened for a moment, and then her eyes narrowed. "Thank you. See if you can find out where she's scheduled to be next." She looked at Mal. "Security feed at the hotel got a match on the woman meeting with Sarah Elliot. Rina Duncan, interplanetary liaison office."

"Well. Guess you don't need my help after all."

While Burnham walked off, talking into her transceiver, Mal made his way back to River's room. He found one of the medical assistants in there, lifting the bed so that River, who was awake again, could sit up. Mal stood to the side until he was gone, and then walked over. River's gaze fixed steadily on him, and she didn't say anything even when he was standing right next to her bed; she simply watched him with those darkly intense eyes of hers.

"I see you," she said softly, and he knew she didn't mean the way she was looking at him. A slight frown creased her face, and she reached out a hand toward him.

Mal hesitated, as if taking her hand, as he'd done innocently so many times before, would pull him into something that he would never be able to turn back from. Never want to turn back from.

"You're still fighting," River said unhappily, without moving her hand. "You're making it more complicated than it is. You're worried. Worried I don't really want this, want you. That it's only because I'm on Serenity, not around anyone else or I would have chosen someone different. That's a contradiction."

Mal raised his eyebrows. "What's a contradiction?"

"You're not around anyone else except the crew, either," River said pointedly.

Mal heaved an impatient breath. "That's different."

"You're covering. You're afraid."

Mal wanted to object to that, but found he really couldn't. Truth was, the strength of what he felt for River terrified him. "River…this ain't—you deserve to have and hold, and—" And he'd never been the marrying type. If he was honest with himself, he would have to admit that for the first time in his life, he'd actually had a notion or two about giving up his bachelorhood, which spoke volumes about this whole situation, but which also made him feel like he'd lost his footing and everything he thought he'd known for certain about himself. "This is what I am. Flyin' Serenity, that's what I got."

Of course, River could see right through him, and she gave him a look that told him just that. "It's what I've got, too," she replied. "I'm not looking for anything different. I had plenty of chances to leave. I never wanted to."

"For now," Mal said, vocalizing what he hadn't been able to put to words in his own head. "River—you got your whole life ahead of you. Might come a day you'll wake up and decide you don't wanna be doin' this no more. It ain't an easy life."

"Well, damn. Someone should have told me that before I signed on," River said, and it actually startled a smile out of him. It was also her not-so-subtle way of telling him that she thought he was being an idiot.

And with that, the tension in the air broke, and Mal finally reached back and grasped River's hand in his. "You're a crazy woman, River Tam."

River laced her fingers through his, her eyes dancing, and she carefully, almost tentatively, moved her other hand to his face, tracing over his jaw and running her fingers over his mouth before settling her palm on his cheek. "You love me anyway."

Their eyes locked, and River's smile faded as she waited. Waited for him, for an admission that was not an easy one for Mal to make. "Yeah," he said after a long moment. "I do."

River moved her hand from his cheek to the back of his neck, gently pulling him down until his face was level with hers. "Say it," she whispered. "Please."

Several things flashed through Mal's mind at that moment—everything Simon was going to do to him, all the trials that would still surely come their way, but it all seemed unimportant when he looked at River. He was under no illusions about happily-ever-after, but maybe—just maybe—this could be a bit of brightness in lives that had been to some very dark places. If he let it.

"River, meili, wo ai ni."

River smiled and leaned her forehead against his. He kissed her once on the lips, gently, mindful of her injury, then kissed her forehead and straightened.

River pressed her face into him; he could feel her warm breath against his stomach. He heard a telltale sniff, and realized she was crying when he felt his shirt getting damp. "I'm fine," she said, before he could ask. "I'm just so happy."

:-:-:

A short while later, Simon and Kaylee arrived at the hospital, having left Ren on Serenity with Zoe. Mal stood up from his seat as soon as they came in. Simon gave him one single look of blazing anger—which, River knew, stemmed from her injury and how she had received it—but he was more concerned with her state of being, and hurried to her side.

"River," Simon said, his voice full of relief. "How are you feeling?" He laid his wrist to her forehead, and River rolled her eyes a little at him. He was so anxious, and she heard his mind already running over the list of things he wanted to check to see if the doctors had been doing right.

"I'm fine," River told him gently. "They patched me up." She wrapped her arms around his waist, closing her eyes and breathing in the familiar, comforting smell of him.

Simon hugged her back, warm and solid and so determined to be there for her, like always. When Kaylee came over to claim a hug of her own, Simon moved to pick up her chart, scanning it and immediately making a disapproving face. "They're giving you hydroxin?"

River resigned herself to a thorough exam by Simon, because she knew he wouldn't be satisfied otherwise, while Mal slipped out of the room. Kaylee sat in the chair beside her bed and held her hand while Simon checked her back and lowered the dosage of drugs being pumped into her IV, outwardly completely professional, but inside still a mix of emotions. River watched him quietly. "It was my idea," she finally said.

Simon looked up from her chart. "Shen me?"

"Chasing the slave ring, working at the hotel. It was my idea. I got myself shot, Simon. It wasn't Mal's fault."

Kaylee squeezed her hand. "'Course it wasn't," she said reassuringly. She turned her gaze on Simon's. "'Cause it wasn't. Simon."

"He's the captain, as he's so often pointed out," Simon said, his expression cold. "He shouldn't be—"

But whatever Mal shouldn't have been doing was left unsaid—at least out loud—when the doctor walked through the door to check on River.

"I'll take it from here, thank you," Simon told him.

The doctor's eyebrows went up. "And just who are you?"

"Dr. Simon Tam," Simon replied, turning his back on the doctor and marking something on River's chart.

"My brother," River explained.

"Ah. The smart one. I see." The doctor sounded very unconvinced. "Well, doctor you may be, but you don't work here, and so you have no authority over our patients."

The look Simon gave the doctor was worse than the one he had given Mal. "You don't need to worry about that. I'm checking her out."

For that, at least, River was thankful—she would much rather be recovering on Serenity under her brother's care, hovering though it might be, than here. She was tired of being here, tired of being grounded, and the med-center was making her more anxious than she would admit. The smell of antiseptic, the beep of machines…it was hard enough visiting Simon's infirmary on Serenity, where she knew things were safe.

And she wanted to see Sarah Elliot, which might happen if they could meet up with the feds' vessel in space. There were still things that she needed to do, injured or not.

An hour later, Simon had signed River out of the hospital, and he and Kaylee helped her into a wheelchair, then brought her down to Mal, who was driving the mule. Simon carefully tucked her into one of the back seats, and then they were off. River closed her eyes against the wind whipping in her face, listening to the quiet thoughts of her three companions. Mal and Simon were both thinking about her, albeit in different ways. River still wasn't quite sure how she was going to break the news to Simon about the newly-developed situation with Mal without it causing too much drama.

She needed to be the one to do it, to be honest with Simon about her feelings, because she and Simon were always, always honest with each other. She wouldn't compromise her relationship with her brother for anything. Simon, who had given up everything for her, who would always give up everything for her, and who never gave up on her. If anyone could bring some sort of understanding to him about this, it was her.

But there were other things to worry about first. After she was sitting in the infirmary, sipping on a huge cup of water that Simon wanted her to drink, Mal agreed to dock with Agent Burnham's vessel, Xiangbalao, a name River found quite amusing. For Alliance agents to have a ship named 'Redneck' just seemed an oxymoron to her, even though she well knew that there were plenty of border-folk who worked in the Alliance infrastructure.

A short time later, Mal escorted a very subdued Sarah Elliot to the infirmary and sent a quick smile River's way. "I'll leave you two gals to it."

Sarah stepped tentatively into the infirmary, a bundle of nerves. These moments were always strange for River, the times she actually met someone whose mind and memories she had seen, because it always felt like she had known them for a while, but to them, she was a stranger.

And this woman, who hadn't been told the full story about what was going on, knew only that someone had tried to kill her because of some sort of business with her husband, and that River had saved her life.

"Guess I should start by sayin' thank you," Sarah said quietly. "I—you didn't have to do that. I feel terrible I got you into this le se."

"I got myself into it." At Sarah's disbelieving look, River smiled. "Really." She swallowed, knowing that what she had to say was going to be difficult for Sarah to take. "I need to tell you what happened, why this is happening. It's going to be hard."

Sarah stiffened slightly, but her eyes pierced River's. "Lotta things been hard lately."

So River told her, because she needed to know. She didn't mention Rina Duncan's name, but told her what had happened to her husband—though she left out exactly how she had discovered this. Sarah didn't recognize River's name, and that was fine. River just told her that she and the crew had been doing some investigating on the matter, which is how she happened to be in disguise at the hotel.

When she was finished, Sarah, who had moved to one of the benches lining the infirmary, closed her eyes and gripped the edge of her seat so hard that her knuckles turned white. "Renci de Shang Di." Stricken, she stared at River, her voice breaking when she said, "My baby—what about my baby?"

"They didn't kill her," River said. "They won't. She's out of the picture, pawn already taken off the board." Sarah's brow crinkled, and River clarified, "They sold her." Their reasoning had been that it was best not to waste what could be taught, and Savannah was young enough to be taught whatever her buyers wanted to teach her. "I don't know where," she added, before Sarah could ask. "But I promise—I will try to find out. I will. And—" Something was intruding on her mind, an argument of sorts taking place in the cargo bay between Mal and Agent Burnham, and River looked back at Sarah. "I think you might be on board a while longer."

:-:-:

"I ain't a gorram babysitter." Mal wanted to be perfectly obvious about that. "Got one kid on my boat already; don't need another. Or three others, as you're proposin'."

"Captain, we have to leave immediately to see if Rina Duncan appears at her next scheduled meeting. I don't know that she will, but it's important that we try to catch her there. We cannot do that and protect the Elliots at the same time. I'm not asking you to keep them on your boat; only to transfer them to the safe house we've set up for them until we can put a stop to this. We have an investigation to continue."

"You wouldn't have even got this far if it weren't for River. We got our own searchin' to do." What and where, exactly, Mal wasn't certain, but he wanted to be free to go anywhere without worrying about a family of refugees on board his boat.

"It's only a two day flight from here, Captain. I will pay for their expenses, and any you have to get there. Besides, I hardly think River is fit to do much 'searching' right now. This will at least give her a few days to recover, and hopefully by then we'll have Rina Duncan in custody."

Mal couldn't much argue the point that River needed some recovery time, and knowing her, if there was going to be some kind of action, she'd want to be in on it. Maybe it would be better to take a few days just to sail and give her time to heal. Mal crossed his arms and sighed. "All right, fine. But you catch that bu huihen de pofu, you tell me straight out."

"I will."

Mal was surprised by himself that he actually believed her. He knew the 'verse was turning upside-down when he took any Alliance agent at her word, even a tiny bit.

And that was how he wound up with four extra people on his boat. Made for a very interesting evening. Kaylee took a shine to the Elliot family straightaway, which wasn't saying much, since Kaylee took a shine to most people. Jayne just got aggravated and went off about the ship crawling with midgets, but Mal just figured him irritable because little Leah Elliot spilled her protein cereal all over him at supper. Then Jayne's yelling got Leah crying, which set off Simon and Kaylee's little Ren, and that got Kaylee started with telling off Jayne.

Then there was Simon, who was still none too happy with him about letting River participate in the events of the past weeks, as if River'd had no say in the matter. Simon kept shooting him little glances across the dinner table, which Mal pointedly ignored. Of course, Mal knew there would have been more than just glares if Simon had really known the half of it.

Somehow, Mal thought that no matter how much Simon knew that River led her own life, the limits of his understanding would be tested in more ways than one if he knew what had been happening while he was gone. Mal wouldn't have even thought twice about this under normal circumstances. He was the captain; he'd never relented under Simon's objections before—though granted, telling Simon he was taking his sister along on a job and telling Simon he was going to have a relationship with her were two entirely different matters.

Much as Simon annoyed the hell out of him sometimes, he knew what Simon and River meant to each other—knew that if it weren't for Simon, the River he knew wouldn't exist. The bond between them had been tested over and over again, and it had never broken. Mal didn't reckon it ever would. Simon meant everything to River, and that would never change—he would always be the other man in her life. It was something that just was, and Mal wouldn't ask her to give up any of what she had with her brother, because that would just be tearing part of River out.

Simon was going to find out about it sooner or later, but River had told Mal earlier that she wanted to talk to Simon. And the fallout was going to be oh-so-pretty.

Oh, yeah. It was going to be a long two days.