Disclaimer: The wonderful characters and the good ship Serenity all belong to Joss Whedon, or Mutant Enemy, or Fox, or whoever actually owns them, and that person or entity is definitely not me. Written for amusement purposes only. No copyright infringement intended or implied.
Rating: T, with rough language warning. May go up for later chapters.
Summary: Eight months after Miranda, the crew of Serenity still struggles to adapt to the "new normal." Constructing, and deconstructing, moments of her life, River attempts to assimilate her new and sometimes painful feelings for Jayne. - - Rayne, but will touch on other pairings. Post-BDM, of course.
Chapter 9: The Touch of Hands
It came as a surprise to everyone that Zoë's labor was difficult, because Zoë did almost everything so competently and with such self-sufficient poise they naturally assumed the birthing process would be much the same.
Fourteen hours of labor, six of them hard labor, had failed to dilate Zoë's cervix sufficiently to begin pushing, and even the warrior woman was starting to flag.
River sensed that it was not only physical exhaustion that was debilitating Zoë, but also her grief, honed to an excruciating point by the knowledge that Wash would never see their child. He had never even known he was going to be a father, and that was what pained Zoë the most…because she had strongly suspected, and said nothing. It had in no way entered her mind during their conflict with the operative that Wash, gentle, funny, pragmatic Wash, would precede her in death. Zoë had thought that if she were killed in battle with the reavers or the Alliance, it would be better that Wash not have the additional burden of grieving for the small spark of life within her, snuffed out so prematurely. Zoë's regret for that decision lay in her conscience like a stone, a burden that sapped her will and her strength and her resolve. River ached with sympathy for her.
Even so, Zoë coped with each contraction while retaining as much of her stoic demeanor as possible, her only signs of pain the small furrow between her brows, her rapid breathing, and her elegant hands twisting the edge of her light blanket into tight, damp knots. Her most recent contractions were still quite intense, but the timing had begun to waver. Sometimes they would come every few minutes, sometimes as far apart as seven minutes. River could feel Simon's growing consternation that Zoë's labor was stalling. The thought of having to perform a caesarian section was troubling him, since he hadn't even assisted at one in years.
"That was a good one, Zo'," Kaylee murmured as the latest contraction eased. She offered Zoë some ice shavings on a spoon to relieve her dry mouth. "You know Simon can give you somethin' for the pain anytime you want."
"No drugs," Zoë answered raggedly after she let the welcome coldness melt on her tongue. "I want to do what's best for the baby."
"You're doing wonderfully, Zoë," Inara said from the other side, sponging Zoë's forehead with lavender-scented water. The Companion flashed an exhausted look at River, standing at the end of the bed. They'd all been in the infirmary almost constantly since Zoë's water broke yesterday.
Moving to the other side of Kaylee, Simon leant one hand on the bed frame and bent down a little so that he and Zoë could talk more comfortably. His expression was sober, but calm and collected. River was so proud of him; she knew his gnawing anxiety, but no one else would ever be able to tell.
"There comes a time when not having a completely depleted mother is what's best for the baby, Zoë. I want to avoid a c-section if possible, so you're still going to have to push…and that's going to take a lot out of you. We don't want either you or your uterus exhausted at that point. You're fully effaced, and almost eight centimeters dilated. Perhaps now would be the time to administer a short course of pitocin. It's that synthetic hormone we talked about, do you remember? It's an old-fashioned method, but the risks are relatively few, especially at this stage of labor. The baby's heartbeat is still strong, it's at station, and the placenta is sound…although the contractions with the pitocin may be more painful, they will speed up dilatation and help bring your beautiful baby into the world as quickly as possible." He reached out and clasped Zoë's hand in his encouragingly.
Zoë closed her eyes and nodded, swallowing. "If you think it's right." She licked her parched lips. "I can handle pain." She tightened her hand around his in return.
"I know you can, jie jie," Simon replied quietly, with tender pride. "No one better."
His words hung in the quiet of the room.
River caught her breath at Simon's subtle but poignant acknowledgment of the suffering Zoë had gone through since Miranda, and the tremendous courage she'd displayed in all the long, lonely days since. These two had grown so much closer, especially in these last few months as Zoë's prenatal care had escalated. Simon had called Zoë his jie jie, his older sister, and it rang true.
Kaylee's mouth trembled little bit, and she and Inara shared a teary glance before Inara had to turn her head away slightly, trying to regain her composure.
A very wry, very Zoë smile lifted the first mate's lips as she looked up at Simon.
"So you finally learned how to talk to people." River saw a faint gleam of moisture in Zoë's eyes. It was the first time she had ever seen Zoë even come close to crying.
"Finally. But I had help," he admitted, glancing at Kaylee before meeting Zoë's gaze with a suspiciously bright one of his own.
"Wash would be proud," Zoë said with a shaky laugh. It was the first time his name had been mentioned since she had gone into labor. With the spoken words an unrecognized tension had been broken, bringing sadness, but also relief.
"He would," Simon nodded solemnly, and they all knew he wasn't referring to himself. Very gently, he lifted Zoë's hand and pressed a kiss to her smooth skin before he surrendered it to Kaylee.
"I'll get that hypo ready," he murmured, and walked across the room to the medicine cabinet.
Kaylee grinned down mistily at Zoë and gave her palm a little squeeze. "All right?"
Zoë nodded, her expression of melancholic amusement wilting away as she felt her belly hardening for the next contraction. River could feel her dread as she waited for the familiar aching agony to crest. Wordlessly, Zoë turned to Inara, and took her right hand for support, and then looked to River. Inara understood immediately, and reached out to the younger woman. River hesitated, until she felt Zoë's warm reassurance slip into her mind. Not your fault, little one, and I never blamed you, never. River took Inara's hand, her lips lifting in a tremulous smile, and clasped Kaylee's small, strong fingers on the other side, completing the circle.
The women of Serenity, bound by flesh and love and loss, faced the pain as one.
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Two hours later the proximity alarm sounded, and River left the infirmary reluctantly to attend to it, especially now that they were all actually needed. Zoë was having pushing contractions, and River and Kaylee had been helping to provide stability at her shoulders or her knees as Inara administered coaching and emotional comfort. Simon said it wouldn't be long, now.
She knew that they were entering the Shuriken, the asteroid belt that circled between the orbits of Eldora and Kyphon, and was generally thought to be the demarcation between Core and Rim planets. She'd set a course avoiding the orbital paths of any known objects, but various possibilities for the alarm came to mind. They were set to pass close to a dwarf planet in the belt, G2-588, which was home to a mining facility that processed ore from captured asteroids. The proximity alarm might be related to space traffic from that, but was it more likely from an asteroid that had changed orbit due to accretion or collision.
She found Mal leaning with his arms folded just outside the infirmary door, his expression taut with worry.
"How is she? What's happening?" Mal straightened up as River slid the door shut behind her. Inara had been giving him regular updates, but no one had been out in a while.
"Zoë is cervix is fully effaced and dilated and she's experiencing pushing contractions," River answered, trying to move around him.
Mal blocked her with his body, throwing up his hands and shaking his head in a "you might as well be speakin' Greek" manner.
"Don't know what that all means; don't really care to. Seems like this is takin' way longer than it took that Petaline, and this is Zoë. Shouldn't I be hearin' some… yellin'?" What Mal was really asking was if something had gone terribly wrong.
"It's different for every woman. Simon gave Zoë some medicine to help her labor progress, and it appears to have helped." River reassured him calmly. "Zoë is remarkably strong, but as she tires and the baby gets closer to birth, I'm sure she will gratify you with some voluble expressions of pain and effort."
"Pain? Why does she need to be in pain? Doesn't the doc know what he's doing? Isn't there some kind of drug he can give her?" Mal paced back toward the shuttered windows of the infirmary, and then turned right back around like a restless tiger in a cage.
"There are many, but Zoë has chosen not to take them at this time. She prefers a more natural method. It's better for the baby." River found Mal's concern for Zoë rather endearing.
"Natural? There ain't nothin' natural about havin' a baby nearly two AUs from the nearest gorram planet!" Mal was trying not to think of the horror stories he'd heard of interplanetary birth difficulties, and wishing they were closer to civilization.
River gave him a sympathetic smile. "Why don't you just go in and see her?"
Mal looked alarmed. "Hell, no. That's – that's – women's –" he stuttered to a halt.
"All will be well, Captain, unless, of course, we're about to fly into an ore trawler," River hinted, cupping a hand to her ear in a listening attitude.
Mal lifted his head, as if hearing the alarm for the first time.
"What? Oh, yeah, better check on that," he muttered, going back to leaning against the wall. River was almost astonished. She had never seen the captain so little interested in the welfare of the ship. His mind was trapped in a circle, revolving around worry for Zoë, apprehension about the birth, and what the baby would mean to the crew of Serenity, for good and ill.
River stifled a sigh and turned to run up the stairs to the bridge. She felt a sudden urgency coming from the infirmary, and knew that Zoë had finally begun to push through the last phase. Oh, no! She didn't want to miss the baby being born. Jayne, who'd pretty much kept to his bunk since Zoë's labor began, stuck his head out as she rushed past the crew quarters.
"What's goin' on?" He came up the ladder and trailed after her onto the bridge, glancing at the yellow light of the proximity alarm flashing, and then moving forward to look out the window. There was nothing visual to suggest what had triggered the alarm, but it would have to be an extremely large something indeed to be seen from this far out. River silenced the klaxon and consulted the flat panel of the nav screen. She tapped out the command for a refreshed telemetrical scan, waiting as patiently as possible for the results to load.
"It's an asteroid pair," she murmured as the data flashed across the board, pointing to the screen as Jayne came to peer over her shoulder. "They collided and broke from their previously established orbits…here…" she ran a fingertip across the listed coordinates.
"Big uns, too," Jayne commented from behind her, reading the volume and density indicators. Over the last few months, River had been surprised to discover how much he knew about navigation.
"Yes, but not a problem…" Her nimble fingers danced over the controls as she changed course. "Required correction is minimal." She listened for the distant hum of the thrusters as they burned on and off in the precise sequential pattern that would move Serenity safely out of the path of the rogue asteroids. She watched for the computer to confirm that course correction had been implemented. Satisfied, she quickly locked on the autopilot and reset the proximity alarm. She could sense a sudden spike in the energy coming from downstairs. It was happening… she had to get back to the infirmary right now!
"Uh, how's Zoë doin'?" Jayne asked then, seeing that she was finished and was probably on her way back downstairs. River wasn't even paying attention to him, so focused was she on the urgent signals coming through her mind.
She twisted around and surged out of the chair frantically, not realizing quite how closely Jayne was standing behind her. She ran smack into his rock-hard chest, and his hands went to her shoulders to steady her, just as the waves of energy intensified to an almost unbearable level.
"Zoë!" she cried out faintly, her eyes closing and her head dipping back as she swayed in reaction. River felt like she was losing consciousness as she was swept into the tidal wave of all the emotions running rampant through the ship. Fear, pain, elation, grief, joy, pride, and finally, a mother's infinite love as Zoë beheld her child for the first time… River's knees started to buckle, and Jayne's hands tightened on her arms.
" – gorram it, girl, why you always gotta have these fits when I'm around –" Jayne's panicked complaining sounded distant and tinny through the roaring of her ears, before it faded away completely.
River…River…River…her name was reverberating quietly in time and space. Was she in the past, the present or the future? There was no way of knowing. She was cast adrift in the waves, sucked under by the riptide, tumbling through breakers, drowning. But she had to listen…someone was calling her back…strong hands were holding her…anchoring her…keeping her from floating away in the warm, dark sea. Slowly, she began to resurface.
"Girl!" Jayne's anxious tone had risen in volume and he was shaking her lightly, one arm now curved firmly behind her back to support her sagging body, one hand gripping her shoulder. "Answer me! You all right?"
River's eyes opened slowly and she stared up at him, his face rushing into focus in exquisite detail. Her heavy-lidded gaze drifted from the tight curve of his close-cropped hairline to the firm, pale stroke of his lower lip. He had a little scar on his right cheek about an inch from his mouth and she'd always wondered where it had come from. A slow, almost seductive smile bloomed across her delicate features as she felt the dizziness recede. She lifted her small hand and brushed her thumb over that little scar. Jayne stilled, and then drew in a sharp breath of air. Something…electrical…crackled between them. His hand tightened on her arm, and almost without volition, he began to draw her nearer.
"River! River!" It was Inara's calling, her voice ringing with joy. Her feet were pounding up the steps in excitement, coming closer. River had never heard or felt such naked emotion pour from the normally guarded Companion.
Jayne started and blinked, as if coming out of a daze, and with a haunted expression, he shoved her away and stepped back.
Before he could flee altogether, River lifted to her tiptoes and pecked a swift, tiny kiss to that irresistible scar. Jayne looked down at her, dumbfounded.
She smiled up at him shyly.
"Congratulations, Uncle Jayne. It's a boy!"
She laughed happily and ran to greet Inara with an ecstatic hug, leaving Jayne standing there, momentarily stunned.
&&&&&&
Science:
AUs astronomical units, the distance between the axis of earth's orbit around the sun, or approximately 93 million miles/150 million kilometers in our solar system…who knows what it would be in the 'verse. Far.
A/N: Yes, I like hands, literally and symbolically, lol. We get to meet our little Washburne in the next chapter.
crazylizzie: This is really River's story, journey, what have you, so probably no Jayne POV. We'll have to figure out what's going on with him by what he says and does (and to whom). ::wink:: Some of the next flashbacks will be from Simon's POV, and there might be some more Mal POV, since that's kinda fun. I know where we're headed, but not how we'll get there, if you know what I mean.
Thanks to all for reading and the nice reviews! Gem