Chapter 9
Mal was sitting on his bed, working on figuring out how much money they had left and what it could be spent for, after, of course, he paid the crew.
This job would be good, and would pay a lot, but first he had to get the merchandise and deliver, and in the meantime his crew needed to eat, and drink, and preferably not die in a screaming flaming heap falling from the sky.
He scratched a few figures down into his account book (despite common belief, he did actually know how to do math, he wasn't Jayne after all). The account book may be indecipherable to all others, and would surely give bankers and accountants alike a heart attack, but he could read it.
Sure, he didn't like writing on all those little lines and boxes, and filling in all those things marked Food and Budget. Just because his writing spiraled all over the place and the answer to a problem may not be on the same page it's written on doesn't mean that it's not an account book…it's just special. Like him.
He was just trying to figure out how to find the extra money he needed for a new engine piece Kaylee had been bugging him for, with dire warnings of explosions should he fail to procure said item, when a knock sounded on his door.
"Come in," he called reluctantly, already awaiting the arrival of Inara into his quarters, calling him to the torture chamber she was calling "lessons".
Instead of Inara's elegantly-clad feet, he was instead treated to the sight of a long length of black hair falling into the room, seemingly unattached as it dangled from the entryway.
He couldn't help it, he smiled.
"Hey Albatross," he said, putting down his account book and neatly marking his place with his pencil. "Did that brother of yours send you? Too afraid to come himself? I wouldn't shoot him y'know. Much."
There was a giggle and River suddenly dropped into the room, twisting in the air to land on her feet. She paused, beamed at him, and hurled herself onto the bed so she was sitting opposite him, mirroring the night before.
"Were afraid, wanted bird to come to feeder. Council was called and girl was elected to go play fetch. Bring back the stick and get a pat on the head, bring back the newspaper untorn and get a reward."
"O-kay," Mal said slowly, working his way through the teenager's convoluted words. "They sent you to get me, because they thought I wouldn't come for them…and then I'm gonna skip the stick, but the newspaper is me coming with you? And they promised you a reward?"
River beamed at him. "Ninety percent is still an A," she said cheerfully. "You will do well in school."
"Just no apples." She nodded solemnly in agreement.
"No apples," she repeated. Then she brightened, looking around his room.
"The pretty birds are flying again." She hesitated, eyes clouding slightly. "That one's hurt; trying to fly north for the winter." She frowned at him. "Can I fix it?"
"Wha?" he asked, almost looking around for pretty birds himself. "This got nothing to do with killer rabbits, right?" he queried suspiciously. Just cause she'd dropped the subject this morning didn't mean she wasn't bringing it back up.
The annoyed frown she gave him answered his question.
"The bird," she said slowly and clearly. "It's confused, going up the down escalator. The numbers are all there but they don't add up; one plus one should not equal three."
Mal thought on that for a second, his brain processing a whole hell of a lot of metaphors all mashed up together, and then brightened as an answer appeared.
"My accounts book. You want to fix it." He felt pretty proud of figuring it out, considering she was chattering about birds and escalators and who knew what else, but she didn't even blink, just kept staring at him.
He hesitated for a second and then handed it over, watching her carefully.
"Be careful now, it's pretty important and-" the vaguely disgusted look she shot him reminded him why he'd given it to her in the first place; she was a genius. Crazy, but he figured she could balance the money. Even if she got confused, at least he'd managed to waste some more 'school' time.
"Won't work," River muttered, flipping rapidly through the pages before stopping on the one he'd been stuck on.
He reached out for the book. "Well, thanks for takin' a look, I'll just-"
She smacked his hand away and gave him another exasperated stare.
"I am trying to fix the bird," she said, once again reverting to that I-am-infinitely-smarter-than-you-of-toddler-intell ect-so-don't-interrupt-me-even-if-I'm-muttering-ab out-unicorns voice.
"You just said it wouldn't work," Mal said in confusion, watching her pencil begin flying across the paper.
"Not the bird, the apple eater," she said absently, pausing in her scribbling to glance around the cabin as if she was looking for the apple in question.
Finding none she returned to her work and let him think things through (really, with all the work he was doing he was going to be burnt out before that blasted school-)
SCHOOL! That was it. Right; school equals apple, got it.
"Oh, you mean the wasting time," he said. River flicked her eyes up at him and then looked back down. "A man can dream Tross," he said. "A man can dream."
River scribbled something else, paused, reviewed, made a note, and then handed the book back.
Mal looked at the edited pages and whistled softly. River's neat hand was spiraled around his in indecipherable x's and equations, looking more like a university math test than a simple accounts book.
In the margins she had written out little scraps of formulas and drawn arrows, and he realized with a start she was trying to show him her work; he had to bite back a smile at that, because he knew from past experience not to laugh (he was proud his sister could hit that hard, but not so glad when she did it to him).
Right in the middle of the page she had circled a string of numbers and symbols that held no meaning for him but that he assumed was the answer to all his financial problems.
He looked up to see her beaming proudly, and gave her an answering smile before handing the book back to her. She stared at it, confused and maybe a little hurt, and he hastened to explain.
"I like it, but I don't exactly understand it. What was it you said? That whole thing about the comprehension? Yeah, I'm gonna take a leaf out of your book here and say that."
River glanced up at him. "It's winter, no more leaves but dead ones."
She looked back down and turned the page in the book, beginning to write again, leaving him pondering the leaves thing.
Before he can ask her to clarify though she finishes and gives the book back, although she keeps the pencil, using it to twirl between her fingers.
Mal looked at the neat script, now thankfully in legible English, and smiled. There, in two columns, was all the expenses he needed and the amount of money he had left. It wasn't a fortune, but it was enough to buy that engine bit he needed.
He paused, looked closer.
"Where'd you find the money?" he asked. River leaned forward and poked a finger at one item.
"Fuel. Unneeded." Mal felt a bit of panic overtake him.
"Let me get this straight, the only way to avoid dying in a fiery explosion of engine is to die slowly and relatively painlessly from oxygen deprivation?"
River nodded and smiled. Mal stared at her.
"No, that's not okay! This is like unicorns and killer bunny rabbits: it's BAD. Except, of course, it's real. Real life." The second that was out of his mouth he flinched and wondered if he could take it back, because if looks could kill, he was pretty sure he'd be dead.
Still glaring River wrenched the book out of his hands, flipped back to the page of indecipherable mumbo jumbo, shoved it into his hands, and then leaped off the bed and climbed rapidly out of the cabin, muttering under her breath.
Mal hesitated, looked at the spirals of letters and numbers, and then jumped up to follow, hurrying out of the room and down the hallway after River, who was skipping serenely, her earlier black mood seemingly forgotten.
He followed her quickly down the hallways, belatedly remembering that he was supposed to head to Inara and Simon, and decided that this was more important. There was something to these squiggles, but he needed River to decipher, and she was headed towards the engine room and not the mess.
Following her into the engine room, he managed not to trip on the pieces of engine all over the floor (he'd already yelled at Kaylee earlier about space monkeys; apparently they were still on the loose) and nodded a hello to his mechanic's cheery greeting.
River paused beside the main reactor and he stopped next to her, waiting for her to acknowledge him.
For all that came, a corpse would have rated higher. Actually, come to think of it, corpses were pretty noticeable. An ant then. A teeny tiny ant. Dead one? He mentally smacked himself. He needed to stop thinking now.
"Hey River," he said. She ignored him, still staring at the reactor and determinedly ignoring him. Kaylee came up behind him and tapped him on the shoulder.
"Hey Cap'n. Aren't ya supposed to be down learning stuff with Simon and Nara?" Mal frowned at the reminder.
"Yeah, but River here went and drew stuff all over my accounts; apparently to stave off us exploding we need to die without air. And now I'm an ant. Possibly a dead one. And here I wanted to be a newspaper."
Kaylee looked at him blankly, slightly creeped out, and he smiled.
"Ignore me." He held out the account book, which was getting more use than just about any time in memorable history. "See if you can understand that."
Kaylee looked, her eyes narrowing, and then looked back up at him.
"I don't know most of this, but I know this bit." She tapped a string of numbers and symbols; looked to be some sort of balancing thing. "It's the fuel mileage. Maybe she was doing somethin' with that."
Both turned to look at River, who tilted her head and gave Mal a duh look through several strands of hair.
"Oh, you figured out a way to use less fuel and go the same distance," Mal said, feeling like he should explain aloud to Kaylee, who was looking between the two with a confused expression.
River gave him another look and spun away from the reactor, grabbing him by the arm and towing him out of the room with her, leaving Kaylee to shout goodbye after them and go back to cleaning the room, wondering over Mal's behavior.
They walked without talking the rest of the way; River radiating smugness and excitement, Mal feeling like he was going to face his doom.
By the time they arrived in the mess and saw the same set-up as the night before (pens, papers, two cortexes, four cups of tea) Mal was feeling vaguely sick and River looked like someone had said she was getting that pet bunny after all, killer cannibalistic fluffiness and all.
When they entered Inara looked up from her place at the table, her face smug as she surveyed Mal. Simon, next to her, looked marginally better than Mal felt.
"Newspaper," River said, and shoved Mal into a chair before settling next to him, reaching for one of the tea cups and smiling happily at Simon.
"Hey now, thought I was an ant," Mal said, grabbing for the tea as well and then feeling his shoulders droop at the fact there was no liquor within.
To her credit, Inara looked totally unruffled. Simon looked back and forth between River and Mal, befuddled.
"You're an ant?" he tried. Then, realizing what he said, he turned an interesting grayish color. "I did not mean to say that," he stuttered. "I am so sorry."
Mal felt a smile tug at his mouth, and River snickered into her tea.
"Remarkable observation skills you got there doc," he said, leaning back relaxedly. "Really, you blew me away. I'm an ant. Have you ever heard such truer words Albatross?" River had tears in her eyes.
Simon was stuttering, and you could almost see the smoke his brain was generating as he tried to think of a way to get out of this.
"Now then," Mal continued, "River here said I was a newspaper as well. What have your keen observation skills got to say on that subject? Huh?"
No answers were forthcoming.
"Pity," Mal said. "And here I am in the middle of an identity crisis. For shame."
"I'm-" Simon started, but Mal spoke over him.
"For shame doctor, letting me down in this time of pressing need. I've got to know, ant or newspaper? And all you do is sit there and mumble. Tsk tsk. If you're not careful, I might have a breakdown. Liable to happen too, with all these options I got available. Then where would you be?"
"Up a creek with no paddle?" River suggested hopefully, her voice strained from the effort of not laughing.
Mal threw up his hands and looked at Simon (now green) in disbelief. "There she goes again. Ant, newspaper, or paddle? Take your pick, I'm done with this."
Then he leaned back and watched Simon squirm, terrified of saying the wrong thing.
He and River could probably have watched all day, except for Inara's interruption.
"While I'm sure this is all well and good," she started, her voice calm as she gave Mal her best shut-up-right-now-or-I'll-stab-you-with-my-stilett o-heel glare, "I really think we should be moving on. Don't you?"
And with that, their first lesson began.
A/N: Okay, no long Author's Note this week because I am sick and writing this chapter with NO CHOCOLATE because otherwise my sister was going to kill me slowly and painfully. Probably by forcing me to watch Dora the Explorer. /shudder. I'd rather stare at the sun for five hours.
SO! No crazy ramble…this thing took two and a half hours of straight typing as it is (omigod does my hand huuurt). But probably next chapter or so.
Anyways, this was one long chapter to say "Sorry for not writing for so long, please don't kill me. Or make me watch Dora. Or stare at the sun. Or abandon me…great, now I have abandonment issues. See what you've done?"
So questions: Is Mal an ant? A dead ant? A corpse? A newspaper? A paddle? A man of mystery?
I DEMAND ANSWERS!
And if you people have anything you want stuck in the crazy spiel of awesome (FOOORTUNE COOKIES!) I can oblige. Names, random objects, crazy bits of dialogue. I have a use for it all.
JUST DON'T LEAVE ME! /starts crying.
Now see what you've done? I need a therapist. Preferably a fictitious chocolate-hander outer. Yeah, my therapist is that nice old lady who lives in the gingerbread house. Eats kids? I scoff at ye….oh god she's got an oven RUN FOR YOUR LIVES AND TRIP ALL THE FAT ONES!
Did I just type that aloud? (Does that even make sense?) But don't trip people, it's rude. Throwing them to the wolves and whacking them in the face with tree branches is perfectly acceptable. But no tripping.
And remember, it's doesn't matter if you're not the fastest runner…just as long as you can outrun someone else.
If you're the slowest runner ever…you're screwed. My advice? Hit someone with a tree branch. That'll work. Or maybe just don't go to the house made of gingerbread in the middle of the forest and expect it to all work out.
Oh, it's my fault is it? You know what I say? Mneh on ye. Mneh! (I don't really know what that means, just a thing my friend and I say)
And you know what else? /hit with tree branch. TAKE THAT!
….Oh dear. I didn't mean this to turn into a semi-ramble. Bad author, bad. My apologies, it's the one in the morning thing talking.
I'll go now.
But I still want answers! And random diatribe stuff! And if you don't cough some up I'll sic my therapist on you.