Disclaimer: Firefly belongs to the amazing Joss Whedon. If you don't know that, why are you reading Firefly fanfic?

Author's Note: I was going to have both this bit and the stealing of the medication in one chapter, but I decided they were too dissimilar in tone to have together. Once again, I will do my best to update relatively soon.

"So, are we actually gonna take any money or stuff, or are we just gonna pretend?" Jayne asked Zoe as they waited in the cargo bay for Simon and River. Zoe frowned at him.

The plan was fairly simple: the four of them, plus Mal and Kaylee, would take the shuttle to the woods the bordered the Tam Estate. Mal and Kaylee would drop them off there and go to pick up the medicine while Simon and River led them into the house. They would all have their faces covered so if something went wrong and they were seen they could pretend to be robbing the place. It was risky, but no one had had the heart to tell River no and her abilities should minimize the risk.

"Everybody ready?" Mal asked a few minutes later as he joined them. Kaylee was just behind him and Simon and River were already making their way up the stairs to the shuttle.

"We are," Zoe confirmed. Jayne grunted and he and Kaylee moved to follow Simon and River.

Mal nodded and shot a worried look at the siblings. "Look after 'em Zo."

Zoe knew he didn't just mean physically. "I will," she promised.

The shuttle was quiet until it landed at the edge of the trees about ten minutes from the Estate where Simon and River had grown up.

Mal didn't open the door right away and River looked back at him. "You sure you can get around the security system? It's not too late to change your minds."

"The system is still the same one they have always used. The last upgrades change nothing. Even the codes have not changed."

Mal sighed and pushed the door control. "We'll be back in hour. You all be out here waitin' or we're comin' in to get you." Zoe caught his eye for a moment before following the rest of her party out. She remained quiet as she followed them through the trees. Jayne didn't talk either, but Simon had found his voice and was half-heartedly trying to convince River that they could still just wait in the woods and not go in.

River ended the one-sided argument quickly. "I have to see."

River got them past the security system as easily as she'd promised and five minutes later they were creeping through the back door of the Tam mansion. River informed them in a whisper that Gabriel and Reagan were alone in the house, talking in the main sitting room.

"Has Jackman told them we're dead yet?" Simon whispered back. When River nodded he continued, "And what are they thinking about it?"

"I don't want to hear it in their heads, I want to hear with my ears," River insisted, moving further into the house. Simon opened his mouth to object, point out that it was needlessly dangerous, but River spoke again. "It's important to me. And you can't hear in your head anyways, so you have to hear with your ears."

"I don't need to hear anything."

River came back and took his hand, pulling him unwillingly along the hall. "You do, you just don't want to."

Zoe and Jayne hung back a bit as River silently pulled Simon along until they were standing just outside the door to the room their parents were in. Simon had the presence of mind to pull the scarves up over his and River's faces just in case, and Zoe and Jayne covered their faces as well.

"This is all Simon's fault!" Gabriel Tam was telling his wife.

Reagan sighed and swished the contents in her glass around again. "Would you please stop saying that? He's dead, alright. They're both dead. We never even got to see them again. Will you just...stop blaming him for a moment?"

\\\

"I know they're dead Reagan!" Gabriel snapped. "And they wouldn't be dead if Simon had just backed off when he was told to."

"He thought they were hurting her."

"Don't defend him, Reagan. He cost you both of them, not to mention the scandal he caused disappearing and then showing up on the cortex with a high level warrant. And dragging River into it. You know she never would have left The Academy if he hadn't forced her. She could have gone so far, and he cut it all short!"

"He thought they were hurting her." Reagan repeated.

"Those damn letters! I read them, just like you did. Did you see anywhere where she asked him to drag her off to the Rim?"

"I don't know. Maybe there was a code, maybe she did try to tell him what was happening. The program must have been frightening at first."

"That's no excuse for breaking the law. He knew she was in a government facility, I thought he had more sense than to risk everything like that. He damn near destroyed us all."

"Well then it's a good thing you disassociated us from him when you did," Reagan answered, a little more bitterly then she meant to.

"I don't remember you objecting when I told him to get out."

"I thought it would bring him to his senses, I didn't expect him to go off and get killed."

"I'm surprised it took as long as it did. Did you hear what kind of garbage heap he had them living on?"

"We should have done more to help him."

"What are you saying? You think we should have thrown our lives away like he did?"

"No, that's not what I meant. I meant we should...we should have told him what we knew. He only went after her because he didn't understand."

"He knew the consequences of his actions."

Reagan sighed and put her glass down. She was tired: tired of arguing with Gabriel, tired of trying to figure what she could have done differently to save both her children, and tired of that little voice in the back of her head that kept insisting that Simon wasn't stupid or rash.

"What are we going to tell our friends?" Gabriel demanded.

"Tell them whatever you want, Gabriel. I'm going to bed."

"Reagan, we have to discuss this."

"Not tonight. Tonight I just want to grieve for them. Is that all right with you? My children are dead and all I'm asking you for is one night to mourn them without listening to you hate them."

Gabriel stiffened. "I don't hate them Reagan. I loved them. But they brought this on themselves. They went against the Alliance."

"I don't want to fight anymore Gabriel. You decide what we'll tell people and you can tell me in the morning. I am going to bed." She didn't give him a chance to object again as she swept out of the room. She didn't notice the two figures just disappearing around the dark corner.

\\\

Jayne wasn't very good at reading people's faces, not like Zoe was. But he could see that Simon was upset. River he couldn't read, but she was a moonbrain, afterall, and also staring at the floor so he couldn't even see her face

"We done?" he asked. Zoe wasn't usually easy to read either, but right now Jayne could tell she was annoyed with him.

She lay a hand of River's shoulder and addressed both siblings. "You all right?"

Simon reached out to push his sister's hair back, leaning forward slightly to see her face. "River? We should go."

River looked up and shook her head. "No. We need to get stuff. From my closet. They don't know it's there, they'll never miss it. And I want Jem."

Simon blinked. "I thought you brought Jem to the Academy."

River shook her head. "I forgot him. He was hiding in the closet when I was packing." She started off down the hall again and the rest of them were forced to follow.

"Why was Jem hiding in the closet?" Simon asked as they caught up with River.

"Daddy wanted to throw him away, said he was getting ratty, so I hid him."

"Who's Jem?" Zoe asked Simon as River darted into another hall and crept towards a doorway.

"He's a teddy bear I bought her when she was eight. She named him after a character in To Kill a Mockingbird which she was reading at the time."

"So he'd be in her room? Won't that be kind of close to where your mother was heading?"

"No. Their room is in the west wing, we slept in the east wing."

"You slept on opposite ends of the house?" Jayne asked. "My ma wouldn't a trusted me on th'other end of ours when I was growin' up, and our house weren't even a quarter this size!"

Simon shrugged distractedly as River stopped outside a door and pressed her ear against it. He touched her shoulder to get her attention and she shushed him, pulling him gently against the door. She whispered something to Simon that sounded like "She's singing" but he wasn't sure.

Simon jerked back from the door and tugged at River's arm. "We're leaving, now!" he hissed.

"Somethin' wrong?" Zoe murmured.

"Mother didn't go to her own room, she's in River's. I'm sorry mei mei, but Jem is just going to have to stay here!"

"It's OK, Simon, daddy's still in the sitting room."

Jayne glanced at Zoe and figured she was thinking the same thing he was; they'd only heard bits and pieces of the older Tams' conversation, but nothing they had heard had suggested that it would be safe to reveal themselves to Mrs. Tam.

"We can't reveal ourselves to mother either!" he whispered desperately, trying unsuccessfully to pull her away.

River pulled her arm out of her brother's grip and opened the door. Zoe jumped forward and followed her into the room, resting one hand on her gun. Simon followed on her heels and Jayne, after checking the hallway, followed as well.

\\\

Reagan Tam jerked in surprise and dropped the doll she'd been holding when the door opened. She'd been on her way to bed, but had changed her mind and come here to say goodbye to her daughter as best she could. She looked up, expecting Gabriel and was alarmed to see a small figure with a scarf covering her face and hair glide into the room. She was more alarmed when the first person was followed by three more, one female, two males, all similarly attired and two of whom were clearly armed.

"Who are you?" she asked shakily.

"Ain't somethin you need to worry yourself about," the second, taller, woman told her calmly. Her hand was resting on her gun and Reagan had no doubt she'd draw it if she had to. The other armed person had drawn his though he wasn't pointing it at her.

The woman who'd come in first pulled open River's closet and was digging through thte pile of stuff Reagan had never been able to bring herself to get rid of, even when she'd known they would never, could never, come back.

"Don't!" she said desperately, standing. "Please, whatever you want, take it, but don't take my daughter's things! Please! They're all I have left of her."

"How sad," the smaller of the two men snapped gruffly. Reagan flinched.

The girl emerged from the closet at that moment, clutching a teddy bear Reagan recognized as having been one of River's favourites.

"Please, don't take the bear. I'll open the safe for you, I'll transfer funds, whatever you want, just don't take my daughter's bear!" She sank back to the bed sobbing and jumped when a small hand toucher her shoulder.

"You're sad," the girl whispered in her ear. "Guilty."

"Take anything else, please!" she repeated pleadingly. "The bear was River's. Simon gave it to her. Please don't take it from me, I've already lost them."

Still holding the bear the girl reached to pull away the scarf but the man who'd spoken grabbed her wrist.

"Don't!"

"It's ok ge ge, she won't tell anyone." She pulled her hand from her brother's grip and Reagan's heart nearly stopped as she found herself looking into a face she never thought she'd see again. It was a little different than she remembered, but then it had been nearly four years since she'd actually seen her daughter's face. She stared breathlessly at her then turned to the man who slowly uncovered his face. She let out a choked sob. River was looking at her sadly, but Simon was glaring at her coldly.

"I don't understand, Commander Jackman...he said he saw your bodies!" She directed the question at River, unable to meet her son's gaze any longer.

"Commander Jackman gave the dolls you broke new names so they could be safe."

Reagan blinked blankly at her daughter and glanced back at her son. But he was looking at his sister.

"She needs to know why. She sees but needs to hear. The dolls need to know why the doll-makers let the bad children take them away." Reagan continued to look confusedly between her children.

"She wants to know why you abandoned her," Simon explained in a harsh voice.

"You were with the government! You were safe!"

Simon made a disgusted noise but it was River who spoke. "They didn't play nice. They went in and changed what was said when you pull the string. It hurt. I told you and Simon's string words changed too, but you still didn't listen. I told you I was hurting and no one came, they still didn't play nice and no one came!"

Reagan felt tears streaming down her face but couldn't think of anything to say. River's voice had gotten progressively higher as she spoke and Simon had put an arm around her. He stroked her hair and forced her to look at him. Reagan saw that she was crying too.

"I came," Simon reminded her. "And the crew always comes. Only reason we're here, remember? We don't need her, or him."

"Could have come sooner if they'd helped you." River looked down at Reagan and reached out. "He gave up everything for me because you made him. And you made me give up. I knew he'd tried to see me, but he never came. I thought he couldn't come and then he did and I saw why he took so long and I want to know why! Why didn't you care about your dolls?"

"I do care!" Reagan insisted. "We thought the Academy was a good place for you! We though Simon was risking everything for nothing!"

"I am not nothing!" River sobbed.

"That's not what I meant. River, Simon please! I'm sorry!"

"Too late," Simon snapped.

"You didn't want it to be anything. You just wanted the perfect life you thought you had. Now we're dead, you can tell whatever lies you like. No more dolls to say the wrong things, wear the wrong clothes." River sniffled and brushed the tears off her cheeks. "You were sad because we were dead. Now you know we're not. Hurt for that." She looked up at Simon. "Time to go meet Uncle Captain, before he has to come for us again."

Neither of them looked back as they slipped out of the room, but the two people who'd come with them shot her dark looks. "You really care about them at all, you'll keep quiet about them bein' alive," the woman said just before she shut the door. Reagan gave herself completely over to her tears as the soft footsteps faded away.