A/N: Glad to have so many readers and reviewers - thanks, folks :)
(For disclaimer, etc. - see chapter 1)
Chapter 3
Mal's first reaction on hearing his young passenger scream was to run towards the sound, pistol drawn. Not that he understood just exactly what would be happenin' to the girl. Apart from the folks who got on this boat with her, there was only the Shepherd and Inara for her to come across, and neither of them seemed likely to do her harm at all. 'Course he might wondered more about a pretty young thing like her partnering a big galoot as the ape that came aboard with her, but her brother was there too, and she seemed all kinds o' happy and comfortable with her choice.
"No, no, no, no..." her voice intoning the negative over and over suggested she weren't in any way happy anymore.
Mal backed up against the wall a moment then swung in through the door of Jayne and River's room in full attack mode. He thought he had been ready for just about anything - he was wrong.
"Da shiong la se la ch'wohn tian!" he swore colourfully when he realised River was gorram naked as a jaybird and in his line of sight.
Spinning back around to face the other way, Zoe didn't quite know what to make of the whole thing. She had gone after the Captain to play back up, but a peek over Mal's shoulder brought a smile to her lips.
"Oh," she said quietly. "We surely interrupted something private..." she began to say, stopping short and frowning when River screamed again.
That weren't no happy 'chase me, spank me' kind of yelling she was doing. She was genuine scared, her face twisted in horror as she glanced out the door. Jayne looked as if somebody had struck him full in the face. Maybe they had, though River hardly looked tough enough. Zoe watched him scramble to get up off the bed and rush to River with a blanket to cover her, only wearing undershorts his ownself. Both the captain and his second lowered their weapons and watched the awkward scene with confusion.
"Come on, bao bei," Jayne was saying as he held River's back tight against his chest, trying to stop her arms flayling. "'S'alright now. Nothin' scary here. If'n there was, I wouldn't let it hurt ya, remember?"
Zoe was surprised by how kind and soft his voice was now. When they came aboard just a short while before, he seemed fierce and crass. How he and River came to be a pair, with her brother's consent no less, she hadn't an idea. Now at least she was seeing a caring side of the over-sized brute she had assumed Jayne Cobb to be. He sure had a way of calming River down from whatever state she had gotten herself into. Question to be answered next was what got her into such a state o' being in the first place. It was the Captain that asked that question.
"Think maybe you got some explainin' to do to me," he said, looking to Jayne who turned his head to meet Mal's steely gaze. "Somethin' ain't altogether right here, I'm guessin'."
"You're not wrong," said Simon from behind the pair who swivelled to see him stood there. "And we can explain..."
A grunt from Jayne proved he weren't happy with that plan. Still, he was glad to have River quiet in his arms now. She was still muttering some but she'd stopped striking out and screaming at least.
"What choice do we have, Jayne?" asked her brother as he glared still, Mal and Zoe looking between the two as if in the centre of a ping pong match.
"No choices. All out of options," said River then, eerily calm as she slowly turned her head.
Peering at Mal specifically from behind a curtain of hair so dark. The Captain would've shuddered with fear were he a lesser man.
"What's that now, little one?" he prompted when she continued to stare.
"No time, no choices," she repeated, seconds before the comm buzzed in the hall.
Zoe went to answer it, not sure whether she was glad or the other thing when she heard her husband speak.
"We found the problem," he explained. "We've been bugged."
"But we can get it off," said Mal as he hurried over to speak. "Wash, Kaylee! You get this thing off my boat, dong ma?" he snapped.
"Mightn't be so easy, Cap'n," said Kaylee with a shake in her voice Mal didn't much care for. "And that bug ain't listenin' in. It's sending out a signal, and we don't know to who."
Mal was not a happy man. Those that knew him a long time and worked aboard Serenity knew it easy, but there was no mistaking the situation even if you was one of the passengers brought aboard this very day. Trouble had been brought to the ship Malcolm Reynolds called home and he didn't take kindly to that. Now all were assembled in the galley, save for Wash who listened in from the bridge, still trying as he was to scramble whatever signal was being sent from the bug attached to the underside of Serenity. The crew were sat around the table, curious to hear a tale to be told by a doctor named Simon and his kin who were stood before them now. Mal faced the boy with his arms folded across his chest, his gun in plain view at his hip.
"I trust my crew, as far as a man can anyhow, and since this trouble began with the picking up of you strange folks... To speak plain, my patience is bein' all kinds of tried today, and you folks don't know me, but the first lesson you're gonna learn is patience ain't something I have in all abundance," said Mal, face stern. "You was gonna tell me a tale a while back, I think now would be as good a time as any for me to hear it."
"We understand, Captain," said Simon, nodding solemnly. "And please believe me, we are not trying to deceive you. The names we gave you are our own, and we're not looking for trouble."
"Always do seem to find some though," said Jayne gruffly.
River immediately shushed him and though he grunted he didn't seem to mind all that much. Their relationship sure did have an oddness about it, and that was one of many things Mal was hoping to have explained by the good doctor.
"Um, I suppose I should start from the beginning. My sister, River, she is... gifted," he explained, shifting in place, mindful of his audience who all eyed him with suspicion yet, not that he could blame them.
He did his best to put into words how River had come to be a student at the Academy and then about her leaving that place. He spoke in vagaries not only to keep the crew from knowing all, but moreover to ensure that his sister did not become any more distressed than was necessary. Jayne usually did a good job of calming her, but River would never be anything but unpredictable. She had been somewhat that way even before whatever the Alliance fiends did to her mind.
"And so you see, Jayne became River's bodyguard," he said, clearing his throat and going on with the story. "The particulars of how their relationship moved on to what you see now is really not my tale to tell, but he was her protector when I couldn't be, and their affection for each other soon became more," he explained awkwardly, running a hand over his face. "When our parents began speaking of sending River back to the Academy, Jayne did the only thing he could, he took River and ran. I was away, working at a hospital on Ariel. They had been gone more than a week before I ever knew what had happened, and two before I was afforded a chance to follow. I found them and we headed for the docks on Persephone together, which is how we came to board this ship."
"Mighty fine tale to tell, Doc, but I think we might be missin' a few important details."
Simon sighed, knowing the Captain was right and yet uneasy about explaining further. His eyes were to the floor when he felt River's presence beside him, her hand on his arm like comfort.
"She is gifted; also damaged," she explained herself, swallowing hard and looking more than a little green when Simon glanced her way. "Needles and pins... the darkness is not her own," she said, fingers of her free hand walking up into her hair and tangling there as her eyes lost focus.
Jayne was by her in a second, a large hand upon her shoulder seeming to bring instant calm somehow.
"Them Alliance folks, they did a number on my bao-bei's brain," he told the crew. "She was smart enough before, from what I figure, but now she... she see's stuff, knows things."
"It's beyond intuition," Simon agreed, "it's as if-"
"She's a Reader," said Mal without a moment's pause as everything fell into place.
"Psychic?" asked Zoe, looking bemused by the very idea. "Is that possible?"
Her question was addressed more to Simon than anyone, being as he was a doctor. Perhaps she really ought to have looked to River herself, but there was something just a might unsettling about the girl yet.
"They've definitely altered the way she reacts to things, even the way she perceives... but I'm not... River?" Simon looked to his sister, at a loss as to how to explain her condition, wondering if she could even do so herself.
"She feels, she knows," she said, shivering as if suddenly cold. "When bad things are coming, and the spiders crawl in. When people are good... like reading books behind their eyes."
Her gaze came up to meet Mal's own, even as Jayne pulled her close, concerned for her condition yet. She had quite the episode back in their room not but a half hour before, and though she seemed as cogent as River ever got after that, she was slipping again now, he could see it.
"Alright then," said Mal at length, nodding his head as he held River's gaze. "Seems to me that no matter what those guay toh guay nowns did, they ain't quite done. Most likely culprit for bugging my ship is goin' to be the gorram Alliance. I'm thinking maybe they ain't altogether finished with their project."
"Little woman's not for takin'," said Jayne with a growl. "You thinkin' what I think you're thinkin'..." he began, threatening in every possible way.
The shepherd got to his feet, making placating gestures with his hands before violence could erupt.
"I'm sure the Captain wants no harm to come to you or your loved ones, son," he told Jayne who looked less than convinced.
They hadn't told the crew everything yet and he hoped Simon didn't plan to. River wasn't just potentially psychic, she had other strengths, physical capabilities that the government had also put inside her brain. If'n those aboard knew that, they was definitely off the ship before they could say boo, and Jayne knew how much River wanted to stay, at least for now.
"Mal?" Wash's voice came over the comm loud and clear. "I tracked the signal."
The Captain moved to the link and hit the button. "Wash, you tell me plain, who's behind this?"
"As suspected, Cap'n. Alliance cruiser has a trace on us. It's also possible they could be using the bug to try to gain control of the ship."
"Mei yong ma duh tse gu yong!" Mal cursed colourfully, before taking a moment to make a plan. "Alright, we change course. Wash you take us any way you got to, just get us to Whitefall. Kaylee, Zoe, you're with me. We're gonna get this gorram bug off my ship."
Weren't in Jayne Cobb's nature to feel remorse, and he sure'n wasn't the Reader here at the table right now, but he was getting all kinds of guilty vibes off his little woman and her doctor brother. The three of them had gone and put the crew of this ship in harm's way after hardly a half a day of being aboard. That didn't sit well with good folks like the Tam siblings, and though he would deny it to his dying day, Jayne didn't much care for it either. Most of his reason was River. She had a yen to stay here, he knew it, and though they had vowed to go out to the rim and hide there, he knew as well as she did that being aboard a vessel, constantly on the move, that'd be the better way to stay out of the way of both her folks and them Alliance hwun dahns that screwed up her pretty little brain. Serenity could've been a home of a sort. Now they'd be lucky if the Cap'n would let 'em stay past dinner time.
"We don't have much, but what we do have is shared equally," said Inara, smiling kindly a she presented plates of food to the visitors. "Thanks to Shepherd Book, we do at least have a little fresh food to mask the taste of the protein."
"Thank you," said Simon, blushing even as he looked at the Companion.
Jayne might've smirked at the display if he were in a better mood. As it was, he just wanted to know what the ruttin' hell was going on so he could protect River and her brother, keep them out of danger like he always swore to.
"Eat up, be strong," River muttered. "Whitefall's not a Wonderland."
"We ain't stayin' on Whitefall," Jayne told her quickly. "If'n Reynolds dumps us there, well, we'll find our way, but that back water place ain't worth the stayin' on. Wouldn't trust the ol' witch that runs it anyhow."
"I'm sure the Captain has no intention of ejecting you from the ship in such a way," said Book as he joined them at the table. "There is more good in some people than is always immediately apparent."
"Mebbe so," Jayne agreed. "But there's a powerful lot of bad is some folks too."
"Mal agreed to fly you as far as Beaumonde," said Inara, daintily sipping her tea. "He may be a lot of other things, but he is a man of his word. You paid your fare and I'm sure he will get you to where you're going. I assume you have a plan for once you reach your destination?"
Jayne, River, and Simon shared a look that proved that wasn't at all true. Fugitives couldn't really make plans, and that was essentially what they had become. In the mind of the Tams elders, River had been kidnapped by Jayne, and they probably saw Simon as having fallen to the same fate. The Alliance wanted back their project, something they had tried to do through fair means first but had now clearly resorted to foul methods. There was no way these three were ever going to be in one place too long. Their lives were now to be spent on the run, perhaps forever.
"Bug's all taken care of," said Kaylee cheerfully as she appeared through the door, a large metal object held between her two hands. "Wash n' me have pulled the plug on it, no more signal. 'Course now the Alliance know where we is, so we're runnin'... again," she noted with a look that was more resigned than anything else.
"I'm sorry we've caused so much trouble to you," Simon apologised fast. "If we had known-"
"You couldn't have known," said Book kindly. "The Alliance are a powerful force, with a great many people involved in their ranks. It is sometimes difficult to know who to trust."
Jayne's eyes narrowed at the preacher. He hadn't expected such words from a man of the cloth. Sure'n folks like him were supposed to preach trust and love for all men, and yet Book seemed wary, and perhaps like he knew more than he was letting on. Jayne had a feeling he was best off keeping an eye on the old timer for as long as they was aboard, not that he expected that to be too long.
The clatter of chop sticks against the table took Jayne's attention. River looked startled by her own movements, her body going stiff in a second, as if she was having some kind of fit, and yet she didn't move nor scream at all.
"River?" her brother ventured, reaching out to her.
Her hand shot up and grabbed his wrist, eyes opening too wide as they stared into Simon's own. With a tone to her voice that he had never heard before and never wished to again, she spoke; "They're coming."
Before anyone could ask what she meant, Zoe came rushing into the galley, looking oddly flustered for one usually so calm. Inara rose from her seat and Kaylee looked panicked, sure only one thing made sense in the circumstances.
"Everybody to gather in the cargo bay, Cap'n's orders," said Zoe solemnly. "We got incoming. It's Reavers."
To Be Continued...