Disclaimer: I own nothing… Joss is lord of the Firefly 'verse. I'm only playing with the characters for my own amusement!

A/N: Whew! This took far longer than anticipated to update. School and work had been running me ragged! Sorry for the long wait. Thank you to all my wonderful reviewers! You have all been amazing in convincing me that this story is worth continuing! I can't tell you the confidence-boost it gave me to read how much you all liked my very first story!! I hope you enjoy the anticipated reunion!

River watched the achingly familiar Firefly land in the distance from the window of her hotel room. She watched until it had set down, before turning away. 'What to do now?' She pondered. She had two hours until the scheduled meeting, and she was not sure how to occupy herself. Sighing, she double-checked that all of her belongings were packed away and nothing had been left out. The one small satchel that she had carried off Serenity had morphed, over the intervening years, into two large duffel bags; all that she owned in the world resided inside them. Seeing that everything was ready, the genius sat on the small bed and went back to her earlier train of thought; how to tell the crew of Serenity what she had been up to in the last 4 years, and just how much to tell. She agonized over that for a good half-hour, stopping only when she was interrupted by someone knocking on her door. Startled, she looked up and reached out with her mind, testing the presence on the other side. When the person was recognized as familiar, River smiled and called, "Qing jin."

She then stood and embraced the woman who entered. The blonde haired newcomer returned the hug eagerly.

"I was wanting to see you before you left, hoped I'd get the chance to say goodbye." The taller woman smiled at her dark haired friend. "It's gonna be weird not having you around anymore, Riv. We all got so used to bein' together…"

River smiled. "I'm not going away forever, Kaen. We can always meet on some planet, more likely the Rim, than the Core, though. Anyway, it's not even decided if I'll be allowed back on Serenity."

"Of course you will! You told me yourself that they never stopped looking for you…"

"Well yes, but they don't know yet what I have done. They may not want me on board when they do." Kaen snorted inelegantly.

"And ifn' they don't, then they're a bunch a ruttin' hundans And if that's the case, which I doubt, then you just wave me and Yuri, and we'll come a running to get you!" River laughed, she knew that Kaen and Yuri would do exactly that, if she asked them to. It lessened her anxiety some, to know that she had such loyal friends somewhere in the 'verse.

The two young women continued to chat, enjoying their last moments together. Kaen retold many happy and funny stories, deftly keeping River's mind from straying back to the impending meeting. When it came time to leave, Kaen walked to the edge of the Docks with River, and bid her friend goodbye there.

"Take care of yourself, and remember, never let them make you feel that you are less than you are, that you've done wrong with the choices you have made. You and I both know that ain't true." River nodded, hugged her friend once more and began to walk towards Serenity, her two bags clutched tightly in her hands.

All had gone well so far; Badger had a new job for them that looked like it might be a good take, there had been no problems with getting the things they needed before retaking to the Black, and so with 30-odd minutes until River was supposed to arrive, the crew found themselves hovering in the bay, somewhat at loose ends.

Jayne was on his weight bench, half-heartedly pumping a few weights to kill the time. He felt restless, ill at ease and he weren't entirely sure why. It was only the moonbrain coming back, weren't that important, not to him anyway. The same couldn't be said for the 2 crewmembers sitting on the walks above him. The doc had been worrying himself almost sick that last few hours, and by the sounds of little Kaylee's constant soothing murmurs, he was still doing so. Jayne could understand the younger man's anxiety; he hadn't seen or heard from his little sister in 4 years and the last any of them saw of her, she was still nuttier than a gorram fruit cake. Buddha knew what the moonbrain had gotten herself into in that time. The merc shook his head, that last weren't entirely fair; she'd handled Early well enough. And she'd seemed reasonably sane on the capture of her leave-taking. He reminded himself to be nice to her when she got there, and if she came back on board. As uptight and Core as her brother still was, the doc had gained Jayne's respect in the past few years and he liked the other man. So he'd be nice to the moonbr… to River, for Simon's sake. Plus, little Kaylee always smiled at him when he was actually nice, so he figured it wouldn't do not harm. Jayne listened to the quiet conversations coming from above him and the stairs at the far end of the bay, where Zoe and Wash sat. Mal stood on the upper catwalks, quietly watching the bay doors, a frown on his face. 'Likely thinking on Nara,' Jayne decided. That expression on the captain's face usually indicated thoughts about the Companion.

A loud, obnoxious male voice could be heard just outside the ship, interrupting the thoughts of the crew. "Piaoliang de xiaojie, ni gu wo he ni xianghao! Wo hui rong ni shengkai ru hua…"

A closer female voice, startling in its familiarity answered the loudmouth. "Wo dui ni bu wen bujian!" River Tam called back, insolent and mildly mocking, as she came into view. "Dirty liumang," she muttered loudly as she walked up the ramp and paused at the entrance of the bay, setting down her bags. Looking around, she noticed the rather pole-axed expressions on the faces of the crew. She frowned and quirked an eyebrow at her brother, silently asking what the problem was, but he was just as bad as the rest.

'Gorram, she grew up good.' Was the first thing that popped into Jayne's head. He immediately pushed it back; remembering that the girl in question was a reader and her brother was his frie… his liftin' partner and sittin' right above him. Unwanted or not, the merc had to acknowledge that the thought was true, though. She had filled out and standing there in clothes that actually fit with that long hair of hers pulled neatly back, instead of hanging in her eyes, she looked all kinds of grown up. The rest of the crew were having similar problems trying to reconcile the 21 year old woman in front of them with the 17 year old girl who'd left them. Simon stared at his little mei mei, he'd never seen her dressed like she was. She looked like a slightly disturbing combination of Zoe and Jayne; a tight leather vest and loose cargo pants, there was even a gun strapped to her thigh! Simon wasn't sure he wanted to know when and why his little sister had started carrying a gun. He saw her eyes travel upwards towards Mal.

"Permission to come aboard, captain?" There was the little sister he knew; the slightly impish look in her eyes was very familiar to Simon. He heard a snort, which could have been from Jayne, but he wasn't sure.

"C'mon in, River." You could hear the slight smile in the captain's voice. "Everyone in the mess, this'll be best sorted out there. Jayne, close 'er up." Nodding, the big man stood up and crossed the bay. Brushing by River, who was just picking up her bags again, he glanced down.

"D'you need a hand with those?" He asked casually, attempting to make it seem like an indifferent and offhand offer.

She smiled and shook her head. "I have carried them much further than the distance from the cargo bay to the mess. But thank you," she added hastily, not wanting to be impolite when Jayne was being unexpectedly nice. He shrugged, hit the button to close the bay doors and turned to leave, River trailing behind him. By the time they reached the mess, the rest of the crew were already seated, with the exception of Simon. Mal noted that River's eyes also swept over the empty chairs, as his own were wont to do. He also noted that there was no shock or confusion as to why there were 2 empty chairs besides her own, but that revelation could wait until later.

"Alright now, River, I do believe you have some story-telling to be doing." Mal folded his arms across his chest and used his best "captain-y" voice in an attempt to compel her into revealing all. He was, however, ignored. River was staring at her brother, a mixture of joy, love and shy uncertainty on her face. Similar expressions were mirrored in Simon's face.

"Ni hao, ge ge." She said formally, patiently awaiting her brother's reaction. Still too stunned by her reappearance and her altered look to speak, he simply stepped forward and wrapped his arms around her in a tight hug.

"Ni hao, mei mei." He whispered, a small smile on his face. She was back; she was real and safe and in his arms. It was all he could think about.

To those watching River specifically, it could be seen that she flinched and stiffened slightly when her brother touched her, before she relaxed into him. Jayne, being one of the ones watching her, noticed the reaction with a small frown. Why would the girl flinch away from her own brother? That didn't make no sense. To him, her relaxing looked more like something she made herself do, rather than something voluntary. He shrugged that thought away, he wasn't a real good reader of body language, he tended to prefer the more obvious signs of people's intentions; like a gun being cocked, or a knife drawn. Mal and Zoe, also watching the new arrival carefully, noticed the flinch as well, but were no closer to understanding its origin than Jayne was. Sure she'd always been skittish around people, but wasn't she s'posed to be past that now; all healed up or some such? Wash and Kaylee, neither very adept at reading body language, didn't notice a thing, caught up as they were in their happiness that everything was apparently starting to right itself.

Pulling away from Simon, River looked around the room, examining each person carefully. There was a hidden anger, and even more deeply hidden pain, in Mal. Some old, carried from the Valley, some new and she knew the origin of that one as well; Inara. While she would have liked to ease that pain, she did not know how, and with what she had to tell, she would likely only increase it. Zoe and Wash appeared much the same, but there were signs of a new ease, a lessening of tensions between them that told the genius that they had finally worked out some of the kinks and trust issues that had been rampant in their marriage four years ago. She was glad for it. River turned her attention to Kaylee and felt a smile break out over her face. Simon was written everywhere in her; the colors that River associated in her head with individual personalities showing a blending of his cool blues and greys with Kaylee's bright pinks and yellows. River smiled again, pleased that her brother had evidently not been as obstinate and pig-headed as she had worried he might be. In him, too, she saw an easing. The Core-bred tightness that Simon had always displayed seemed to have finally been worn away a bit, leaving a happier, easier man in its wake. There was still undo worrying in him, most of it for her, she saw, but that was to be expected; Simon was a worrier by nature! Finally, her gaze rested on Jayne, and here she was surprised. He too had changed; looking carefully, she saw that the bright reds and oranges of his personality seemed to have mellowed somewhat, taking on smoother edges. It appeared that he had finally accepted the crew as family and had even, apparently, struck up a friendship with her brother. Of all the things River had noted since stepping foot back on Serenity, this was the most surprising. It was certainly not something she had expected or predicted, although she had briefly hoped for it.

Pulling away from her thoughts, River nodded a quiet hello to the room at large, a gesture that was returned by most parties. Deciding with a sigh that she couldn't prolong this anymore, she turned to the captain.

"Where would you like me to start, Captain?"

Looking at her thoughtfully, Mal said, "I reckon the beginning's as good a place as any."

She nodded and sat in the empty chair beside her brother, Jayne sitting on her other side. The rest of the crew shifted in their seats; making themselves comfortable to hear her tale.

"It started when Early came," she began. "It was one of the longest moments of clarity I had had in years. I knew he was there, what he wanted and what I needed to do to stop him." Here she paused and eyed the captain. "Had you not pushed him out into space, I would have killed him when he came back onboard his ship. It is what my training dictates, to eliminate all threats without hesitation."

She felt Simon stiffen in shock beside her, but ignored him as she continued on. "His arrival here was a wake-up call for me. I felt alive, aware in ways I hadn't felt in months. I was finally able to gain some control over my own mind. Enough so to manipulate Early and get rid of him, and then to realize the necessity of leaving." Here she was interrupted by the crew.

"Now River, there weren't no reason to leave..."

"River you can't believe that we would be better off without you, surely mei mei?"

"Why would you think that leaving was best? That doesn't make sense…"

"You didn't believe none of what you said to Early, did you? 'Bout us bein' better off without you?" Kaylee asked fearfully, guilty at the thought that she might have been part of the reason her friend had left.

River raised a hand, effectively stopping the protests and questions coming from everyone but Zoe and Jayne, who were quietly keeping their council. "Please, try not to react too much, it will slow the story-telling and I cannot push you out when your thoughts and emotions are so loud." The reminder of her abilities and the implication that they were hurting her quieted the unsettled crew and they quietly waited for her to continue.

"Thank you," she said, feeling her sudden headache ease a bit. She hadn't been in such close proximity with so many unguarded minds for so long that she was unused to it now. She felt a brief temptation to dive into Jayne's mind; it was always so sheltered and calm in there, she had hidden there more than once during her time on Serenity.

"As I said, I felt the need to leave. I saw the danger my presence repeatedly put you all in, the trouble I had caused. And I knew it would not stop. Early was the first of what would have been many bounty hunters, assassins or government operatives who would have tracked me down eventually. So I left.

"At first, I just wandered a bit, tried to sort out the mess in my mind. I ended up on Muir before anything significant happened. There I found some of what I'd been looking for and a few things I never expected…"

(A/N: I totally almost left this as a cliffhanger… but I'm nicer than that!)

"I found sanity, at least the start of it, and friends. Old friends, from the Academy." Stunned silence met this proclamation, and she continued on, unhindered. "I was not the first student to escape, nor, as it turns out, the last. Nicos and Sia were the first to disappear; they were sent on a job together the year before Simon extracted me. Being sent on jobs in pairs was highly unusual and they took full advantage of that. I was the star pupil, but I was certainly not the most experienced. Both of them had dozens jobs and several years of training under their belts when they decided to escape. They disappeared so completely that the Alliance still had never even glimpsed them by the time I found them." Pride tinged her voice, her friends were smart and had avoided trouble in a way she had been unable to do.

"Finding them was invaluable to me. As you know, the Academy stripped my limbic system, taking away the natural defenses in my mind. This is part of what made me crazy. Sia taught me how to rebuild those defenses, to make them stronger, nearly impenetrable. She taught me how to guard my mind against other psychics and how to control my reading of others. Nicos trained me in fighting. Much of my strength and lessons were worn away by the months of idleness, dementia and drugs here on Serenity. He helped me retrain my body for combat. I don't know what I would have done without them." Again she paused, looking at the crew. They were enthralled by her tale, though she noticed that Simon was feeling guilty again.

"You did what you could for me, Simon. There was nothing in your training at the Medicad that prepared you for dealing with a partially crazy psychic. You could not have known."

Simon shook his head, staring at her. "Did – Did the drugs I gave you, things I did…. Did they help? Or did they just make everything worse."

River was silent for a moment, weighing her desire to tell the true against the equally strong desire to not hurt her brother more than she already had. "The drugs didn't help, no, but they didn't usually hurt either. They couldn't fix what I am, but they made you feel better, so I didn't say anything." She shrugged, there really wasn't much more to than that.

Apparently it wasn't enough, because Simon's face went white and his eyes widened in shock and realization. She cut him off before he could say anything.

"You did what you thought was best, and it didn't harm me seriously. This was all so long ago; please don't make out to be bigger than it is, Simon. I got past it all a long gorram time ago."

"Now hold on, lil' witch. Are you saying you let yer brother drug you for fun? And that it was hurtin' ya? Why didn't you say something?" River just stared at the irate browncoat, waiting until he was done.

"What would you have had me do, Captain? Had I said anything, you would all have written it off as crazy talk, or just ignored me outright. The drugs had no seriously detrimental effects on me, and I knew the futility of protesting them, so I let it be."

To that there was no answer. As much as he would have liked to deny it, Mal knew that they would have done exactly what she said they would. It was rare that anything River had said was taken into account, foolish now in hindsight, given that she was a genius reader and all. With a short sigh, he nodded his head in acknowledgement.

"Alright, River, what happened next?"

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Chinese Translations:

Qing jin – "Come in"
Hundan – "Bastard/jerk"
Piaoliang de xiaojie, ni gu wo he ni xianghao! Wo hui rong ni shengkai ru hua… – "Pretty lady, hire me for the night and I'll open you like a flower…"
Wo dui ni bu wen bujian! – "I neither see nor hear you"
Liumang – "Bastard"
Ni hao, ge ge – "Hello, big brother"

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Haha, now I'm leaving a cliffie!!

Reviews are love, feedback is bliss, constructive criticism is duly appreciated!

I'm doing a quick poll: How many people think it's alright for Mal to call River "lil' albatross"? To my knowledge he never used that nickname before Miranda, and since the BDM doesn't happen in my story, I'm not sure about using it… What do you guys think?

Also, do I have River's voice right? Sane-River is so hard to write!