Prompt: River, she rarely played with uneducational "toys" in her childhood but Wash's small plastic lizards had their uses

Timeline: Pre-relationship

a/n: This was originally written as a gen piece, to fit the prompt; I've since made it much more overtly shippy, as you see here. Also, yes, I've watched the Serenity outtakes way too much.

Unintended Usages

Looking down at the screens on the bridge, River frowns, because she certainly hadn't told the ship to do that.

A tiny click sounds off the metal space as she flips a switch.

A corresponding click from the opposite side of the room indicates the reason Serenity is disobeying her; the only reason the ship ever would, really – her sha gua of a Captain giving orders which are clearly quite incorrect.

Very careful not to look (that would spoil the game, and she does like to play), she flicks the switch again. And then again, and once more, faster and faster until the clicks are nearly indistinguishable, and Mal's got quick hands but hers will always be just a little bit faster, so -

A stegosaurus flies through the air, and it's not that his aim is bad, exactly, but she doubts he meant it to hit her right above her eye, and in any case, it makes her squeal in surprise.

He's out of his chair in a flash, his soft heart and gullible nature luring him right within range, and she pounces quick as a raptor, leaving Mal on his back, being menaced with tiny tail-spikes.

"Just because it was a herbivore doesn't mean it wasn't intended for combat," she tells him.

"Looks more like a thing made for defense," he points out, indicating the rows of plates on the creature's back, not seeming all that put out by his current position. He likes to play too, and she knows it, feels it in the instinctive rightness of his hips beneath hers.

"Highly debated," she says, mastering reluctance and rising, offering him a hand up that doesn't contain a spiky plastic form. "Might be all part of a shell, bristling with spikes and surliness and bright warnings to keep away, don't get involved." A sidelong look shows he's watching her very carefully; he's always been the one who bothers teasing out the practical intentions from her metaphors. "Or they could serve a thermoregulatory purpose. Or," she says, turning back as she leaves the room to toss the object of debate back to him, "they might have served a sexual purpose. A flamboyantly prickly exterior can be seen as a highly attractive quality in a mate."

There's a clatter of plastic on metal as Mal fumbles the catch, and River giggles her way down the passage, never ceasing to be amused by how easy it is to fluster him; he's nearly as bad as her brother when it comes to these things.

On that thought, she fishes the tyrannosaur from her pocket and smiles at it. "Shall we go find Simon?"

Mal will come around eventually, she knows, though he may never look at that stegosaurus quite the same again.