Chapter Three
Inara was just settling down to a nice, calming cup of tea when there was a soft knock on the shuttle door. "Come in, Kaylee," Inara called, recognizing her friend's knock immediately.
"Huh-huh-hi!" Kaylee gasped through nearly hysterical tears.
Inara jumped up, put a comforting arm around Kaylee, an dled her to the sofa. "What's wrong, sweetie?" she asked, handing Kaylee a handkerchief.
Through many more tears and gasping for breath, Kaylee told Inara that Simon had just proposed to her. Or, Inara was pretty sure that's what Kaylee meant. There was an awful lot of blubbering going on.
"But, sweetie, isn't that a good thing? I mean, you've been wanting him to propose for so long now."
Kaylee scowled at her. "No like this!" she exclaimed.
"Not like what? Sweetie, would you like some tea? It will help you relax." Inara poured Kaylee a cup without waiting for a response.
"I don't need to relax!" Kaylee yelled, jumping up. Silence ensued for a few moments. Then Kaylee sank back into the sofa and starting crying again. "It was supposed to be all romantic. He'd do something special and get down on one knee and say he couldn't bear the thought of living without me in his life and would I do him the great honor of being his wife." Kaylee sniffed. "Was that too much to ask?"
Inara thought it sounded pretty basic, but she decided to keep silent. Even agreeing with Kaylee seemed dangerous at this point.
"I didn't think so! Not too much to ask at all! I mean, for as long as I waited for him - "
Inara nodded. Not that Kaylee was paying any attention to her.
"And what do I get? What do I get as a marriage proposal? Certainly not the romantic one I had coming to me after two years with that idiot!" Kaylee cried.
Inara figured as much, considering Kaylee's current state. She ventured forth from her silence, trying, "How bad could it have been?"
"Pfft," Kaylee huffed. "It's Simon."
Oh. So, pretty bad, then. Aloud, Inara dared to ask, "What exactly did he say?"
"'Kaylee, with a baby coming, we really ought to consider doing the right thing by him or her and getting married,'" Kaylee said in a mocking tone.
Inara would have laughed, but Kaylee's waterworks had started again.
"Like he couldn't bear to marry me except it was the right thing to do since he knocked me up!" Kaylee said through her latest batch of tears.
"Sweetie, he loves you, you know that."
"He's an ass!"
"Yes, but an ass who really does love you," Inara tried. "I'm sure he had planned to propose in a more romantic way - "
"Well, it's too late now!" Kaylee interrupted. "'Cause I told that moonbrained stuck up doctor the he can - " here Kaylee shot off in some very colorful Chinese.
Inara took a sip of her tea and let Kaylee calm down. After a few minutes, she handed Kaylee back her cup. Kaylee took it this time. As Kaylee sipped her tea, Inara rubbed her back. She didn't know what to tell her friend. She was sure Simon hadn't meant to sound like a complete idiot. That's just how he ended up sounding when he was trying to talk to Kaylee about something important. Inara kept silent on the subject at the moment, though, because as much as she liked Simon, she didn't think a defense of the young doctor was what Kaylee needed to hear at this precise moment. They must have sat there for half an hour, Kaylee drinking her tea and Inara rubbing her back and playing with her hair.
"All crew to the kitchen, please," River's voice sang across the intercom.
"They're back already?" Kaylee asked.
"That certainly didn't take very long," Inara said. Suddenly she had a bad feeling about the kind of mission they were getting themselves into here. Ten minutes later, after listening to Mal explain what the Browncoat Underground wanted them to do, her fears were realized.
"Nice place to set up a Browncoat Underground," Jayne muttered. "Right next door to an Alliance Assassin Academy. Might as well be 'cross the road from a weapons factory rigged to explode."
River was being oddly quiet and was especially avoiding Jayne's eyes. The mercenary obviously didn't like this idea. (Inara doubted any of the crew actually liked this idea.) But behind Jayne's normal "Are you insane?" expression, Inrara sensed a deep concern fro River. This mission, after all, would be incredibly dangerous for her.
"You really want us to do this? Attack an Alliance Academy?" Simon asked.
"Aren't you all about doing the right thing?" Kaylee asked bitterly. Simon looked away.
Mal looked from one to the other, as if finally noticing that they weren't sitting beside each other. "Whether it's the right thing or not remains to be seen," Mal conceded. "As it is, I ain't ordering any of you to participate in this venture. In fact," he looked at Inara very briefly and then at Kaylee, "there are a couple of you I'm ordering not to set a foot towards the place. It ain't gonna be easy. And it ain't gonna be especially healthy."
Silence.
"We've got a couple of days to think about it," Mal said after a few moments. "They're gonna lead us to a hangar, give us a good welcome. I'll give y'all some time to decide for yourselves." Mal nodded once, then walked out of the kitchen. Quickly, Inara rose and followed him.
"Mal!" Inara called after him.
"Can't I do anything right by you, Inara?" he asked as he spun around. "I lead them into danger, you stand there telling me not to. I leave it up to them whether or not I lead them into danger, and you still follow me to yell at me."
"I didn't follow you to fight, Mal."
"Well, that'll be a first." He met her eyes. She looked away first, hating herself for it. "Why did you follow me?"
"I just, why is this time different? Why didn't you just order them to do things your way, as usual?"
"Because this ain't my way. This is their way."
"You don't trust the Browncoats?"
"These are a new breed of Browncoats. Using secrets as weapons. That don't sit right with me. And it don't sit right with River."
Knocking echoed through the ship. Three knocks at a time. Mal gave Inara one last bewildered look before he turned around and walked towards the hold. Inara followed.
River was already at the door, waiting for Mal. "The Browncoats are here to tow the ship to the hangar."
"Tow?"
River opened the door. A young woman about twenty-three years old stood in the doorway, a big smile on her face and a tow-cable in her hand. She was short and thin but looked strong. She wore brown overalls and somehow reminded Inara of Kaylee. Maybe it was the grease stains all over her shirt. "Hi there!" the girl said excitedly, giving a little wave. "I'm Kuan-yin."
"Why not just let us fly her to the hangar?" Mal asked abruptly.
Kuan-yin blinked, fiddling with the tow cable. "Well, Captain, it's not far from here, and it's not so easy to fly in and out of."
"We happen to have a very capable pilot."
Kuan-yin looked around for help. Her eyes landed on River.
"It's underground and secret. They're going to take us there so we can't see the way."
"What's the matter? Don't trust us?" Jayne asked from the catwalk. He was armed in his usual war gear.
Kuan-yin looked up at him. "Jayne Cobb."
"I'm that obvious."
Kuan-yin shrugged. She looked back at Mal. "This is the deal, Captain Reynolds. You can do things our way or you can continue to camp out behind the chemical plant. Your call." She swung the tow cable like a pendulum in front of her as she waited for Mal to answer.
Inara half expected him to say hell with them and their hangar fortress. But a breeze brought the chemical smell inside, and Mal immediately nodded.
"All right then," Kuan-yin said. "Let's get you all to the real Browncoat Underground."
The ride would take half an hour or so. They moved slowly. Kuan-yin sat with the crew in the kitchen, making quick friends with Kaylee.
"Wait until you see the beauty I'm working on in the hangar! Oh, she's a masterpiece!"
"What model is she?"
"Oh, she's got all sorts of stuff in her. Whatever I can Frankenstein together. What I'm aiming for is a Firefly."
"Like my ship, do you?" Mal asked from the head of the table. His arms were crossed and he'd been grumpily staring at the Browncoat since she'd taken a seat at his table.
Kuan-yin looked up and around the kitchen. "She is a beautiful ship. Freedom itself in a metal hull. Doesn't hurt that she'll run forever. Or that I happen to come across the shell of one a year ago."
Kaylee's eyes were glowing as she nodded excitedly.
Mal eased off the stranger now, relaxing his arms. River was sitting next to him, trying to be discrete as she edged closer to Jayne. Inara assumed they were holding hands under the table. Or, maybe not hands. She stopped thinking about it. Mal was pointedly not looking at them. Inara knew he had to be going crazy with the knowing. Ignorance would have been bliss. Ignorance would also have led to Jayne being sucked out of the airlock.
Zoe meanwhile was the only one at the table who looked completely calm, reading a newspaper Kuan-yin had brought with her. Every once in a while, Zoe would shake her head as if in disbelief.
"How long have you been working on it?" Simon asked Kuan-yin.
"Her," Kaylee corrected, glaring.
Simon looked away.
"Oh, two years this time. That shell really got the project off the ground. I'm really cooking now. Every time folks got spare parts they can't make heads nor tails of, they give em straight to me."
"This time?" Jayne asked, as if he'd gotten stuck at the beginning of the sentence.
"I had a collection started back home, but then the war started, and they needed engineers, so I packed on up, left my beauties at home, and went off to war. Every now and then my folks send me a big package of more, but it's getting pretty hard to get post here from the black."
Inara was impressed by her dedication to her hobby, and she told the young woman so.
"Oh, more like an obsession, really. The lads in my unit all tell me I need a man in my life. Would kick the ship right out of my thoughts, they tell me. But I don't think so. Ain't a man alive who's more interesting than my bird."
Everyone laughed. Kaylee nodded her approval again, not meeting Simon's eyes.
The ship stopped. There was a distant cranking noise. Then it felt like they were going down, as if they were on a giant elevator. They stopped again. Now that everyone was quiet, Inara could hear the distant clamps of another set of tow cables. Then the ship lurched slowly forward again. The crew sat in silence. Kuan-yin bobbed her head from side to side as if counting. The ship jerked to another sudden halt about ten minutes later. They'd arrived.
Kuan-yin slapped the table. "Well! I guess you all get to see her for yourselves now! Come on, then! I'll show you around the compound! We've even got special guest quarters for ya'll iffen you don't wanna stay on your ship the whole time. And you'll see right quick why we couldn't just have you land here. And it's not just because we don't trust you." The girl winked at Jayne. River glared for a split second.
Kuan-yin led the way out of the kitchen. Inara was the last to leave. River was waiting for her at the door.
"What's wrong?" Inara asked.
"Mal wants me to do this."
Inara studied her for a moment. "Do what exactly?" With River it was best to check.
"Talk to you about men."
"Mal told you to talk to me about men?" Inara repeated.
"He thinks if you tell me that Jayne is only after one thing, that I'll believe you and dump Jayne before I get hurt."
"He does, does he?"
"Not out loud," River conceded. Inara had thought not. "You convinced the Captain not to kill my mercenary. But he doesn't like us. He wants us to stop."
"You're telling me this so I'll talk to Mal for you?"
"No. I'm talking to you so that when Mal asks you to, you can say that you tried." River paused. "So try."
"To talk you into leaving Jayne?" Inara asked. River nodded. Inara shook her head, deciding to play along. "All right. Fine. River, Jayne is in love with you. So you should leave him."
River blinked. "What?"
Inara continued, "Now I know you like him a great deal, and you feel safe and secure around him. I know he makes you feel like a real woman and infuriates you at the same time. But he loves you, and that can't be good." Inara gave a smile. "How was that, do you think?"
River laughed. "I don't think that's what the Captain had in mind. But thank you." She gave Inara a warm hug. "Now, let's go see this super secret spy lair," River said, cocking her head toward the exit.