Ira Deorum: Vox Populi Vox Dei.
Chapter 2
It's my estimation that every man who had a statue made of him was one kind of sumbitch or another. The statues are never about the men they resemble, but what we needed at the time.
--Malcolm Reynolds, Captain 57th Overlanders, I.F.A.
Badger's face bore a look of sour determination until he realized he that he was talking to Malcolm Reynolds.
"See here!" Badger exclaimed, clearly outraged. "'Ow'd you get on the list?"
He turned his head away from the camera so that Mal and Zoe found themselves staring at his head in profile. "Budgie! You stupid sodding bastard! I am going to cut your fuckin' fingers off and 'ave 'em served wi' me breakfast!"
"What now, Badger?" someone's irritated voice, presumably Budgie's, answered from off camera. "Ye get another bur in yer arse?"
"I 'ave as a matter 'o fact," Badger shouted. "Name 'o Malcolm Holier-than-fuckin'-thou Reynolds! Why is he wavin' me at this address? Can ya tell me tha;'?"
"Malcolm Reynolds?" Budgie shouted back from off camera. "Thought 'ee was dead!"
"Badger!" Mal shouted into the audio pick up. "Not Budgie's fault."
"Then 'ow in the sphincter of 'ell is it that yer wavin' me at this address?" Badger demanded to know. Mal could see that Badger's anger was under ridden by more than a little fear.
"Got my hands on the use of some very expensive equipment for a little while. Had to call in some mighty big favors. Worried about ya."
"You? Worried about me are ya? That's a bloody laugh 'n a half! Ooh d'ya think yer tryin' to swindle, Reynolds? What are you really up to?"
"Just the usual," Mal answered, hugely enjoying Badger's obvious discomfiture. "Checkin' ta see if you might have some payin' work."
Badger was the sort of man who paled with anger rather than blushing, and he turned as white as new bed sheet before gasping out, "Lookin' for payin' work is it?"
"M-hm." Mal nodded his head at the camera built into his console. "You could use some help from what I hear. Friends in need and all that."
"Oh, too right you are! Malcolm Reynolds, my dear old friend!" Badger's sarcasm was so thick that it jiggled like the gelatins hospitals liked to serve as a dessert.
Mal responded with a wry grin and a careless shrug of his shoulders. "The enemy of my enemy is my friend, or haven't you ever heard of that?"
"Oh, yes, of course!" Badger sneered. "What is it that you think you can do to 'elp me?"
"You still got business to run, right?"
"Got business to run ah'right," Badger responded. He was so angry that he now seemed dizzy. "Nothin' you could 'andle."
Mal responded with a deliberately hearty laugh. "You got nobody else that can handle the go se we shovel, Badger."
Badger removed his fine derby hat and bit the rim of it. This seemed to help him calm down a bit. "Tried to get you killed more'n once meself and here ya are. Might be somethin' to what ya say. How do I know ya won't help Niska?"
"Because you're my great aunt's pet chihuahua stood up next to Adelai Niska and we both know it," Mal said. "'Cause me and Niska share no love and because if he takes your turf I got no choice but to do deal with him."
"Oh, you're wrong about there bein' no love between you and Niska, Mal," Badger replied with a nasty grin. "Word I get is that 'e has fallen madly in love wi' your brown-coated arse. What I 'ear is that he fancies over you when he's sittin' on the crapper."
Zoe burst out laughing.
"I find it a might amusin' myself," Badger said, still grinning at Mal. "Oh the visions I have when I think o' 'im rakin' you wi' 'is nasty claws! I'd give a few bob to see that, I tell ya."
Mal forced his nastiest grin onto his face. "Funny thing is, the visions I have are of you with your filthy little paws on him. I can't think of a better fate for him."
"Or maybe the other way round," Badger said, giving Mal a deeply suspicious stare.
"Like I said before, I ain't so terribly fond of that idea. As much as I'd enjoy watching him do to you what he did to me, he'd soon have me tied up in the rack he bled you out in. Wouldn't be sanitary."
"You'd like to see me there and I know it!" Badger snapped.
"No, I wouldn't. You ain't half bad compared to some I know," Mal retorted. "Niska had me over for one of his little sleepovers. Can't say that I enjoy the way he entertains his guests over much."
"You lot are the craziest bastards in the 'verse," Badger said. Mal could all but hear the wheels turning the little man's head. Badger's change in attitude was that obvious. "Ya did get away from 'im, though, dintya?"
"That we did," Mal replied. "Tore up his shiny skyplex some, too."
"Yeah, that was the subject of much discussion for a while," Badger said.
There was a prolonged silence while Badger chewed at his lip. "I have some things I need delivered to different places. Won't be easy and like as not you'll a acquire a few new holes in your scratched up arse tryin' to deliver' 'em. You might die sum-aught, but it'd be worth the gamble ta me."
"That won't be nothin' new," Zoe exclaimed. "One or more of us gets a new orifice in our anatomy every time we do one of your jobs, Badger."
Badger gave the camera on his end a bitter smile. "No funny stuff this time. I really do need this lot delivered to tha right people. It's 'eavy. Can that old boat o' yours carry 'er rated load?"
"No," Mal answered, "not from the ground. Can push just about anything along in the black, but we can only lift about twenty-thousand kilos in a one gee field."
"That much, eh?" Badger asked with a speculative note in his voice. "Tha'll work. Need only ta make one trip down to pick it all up."
"All right," Mal said. "We're only two days out."
"'Spose you're short of fuel and fodder as usual?" Badger asked.
Zoe nodded while Mal gave Badger a grim face.
"Go round the far side 'n dock at Brother's Down Under," Badger said. "Traffic'll give ya the lock number," Badger said. "What name are ya usin'?"
"Ouroboros," Zoe answered.
Badger gave out an amused snort. "That fits. You lot are always bitin' yourselves in the arse. Later."
The screen went dark as Badger terminated the wave.
"Well, we've got ourselves a job," Mal said.
"Probably not a job we really wanted," Zoe said.
"Beats haulin' nuggets outta Highland on ThreeHills," Mal opined.
"Not so sure about that, sir," Zoe replied. "Like as not we'll be haulin' Badger's payroll."
"Huh! Do ya really think so?" Mal asked. "Surely Badger wouldn't trust us ta..."
"Who else has he got, Sir?" Zoe asked. "We got a rep for doin' what was asked of us without filching. He for damned sure can't spare the men to ride herd on his coin and you know that no one else would give this gig a try. He's fightin' a war and we're soldiers. The man's a creep, but he ain't stupid. 'Sides, you never could ride by a windmill without havin' a go at it."
"Damn!" Mal exclaimed. "Another windmill and I'm just now startin' to heal up a little."
"Way I see it, sir, it's six of one and a half-dozen of the other. If we take Badger's job, we'll be killin' them that's already huntin' us."
Mal heaved a sigh. "I conjure you're right, Zoe." He rubbed his face with both hands. "I think I had best be gettin' some shut-eye before the wandy wears off."
"Don't drink no more of that stuff tonight, sir," Zoe said as Mal left the bridge and started down the forward ladder. "You know what they say."
"No, what's that?" Mal asked over his shoulder.
"If you drink to much of the wandy, you wommit."
"Iyuh! Strawberry at that. 'Nite, Zoe."
"Night, sir."
Zoe sat down in the pilot's seat and noticed Wash's favorite dinosaur, the stegosaurus. With a smile she picked it up and rubbed it against her cheek. She cried, but she kept smiling. The pain of losing her husband did not diminish her memories of him. She never wanted to forget him. A timer went off and reminding her that she was on duty. It was time to bring the gravity back up to Earth normal. She heard Mal let out a loud groan from his bunk as she moved the slider left-to-right. When the gravimeter read one gee she stopped. Mal hated it the way she handled changes in gravity, always had, but she knew from experience that increasing gravity was like pulling tape away from one's skin. It was usually a thing best done quickly.
Down in Serenity's hold at 0700 ship's time, which was by law the same time as it was on Chengdu, Sihnon, a bleary but not terribly overhung Simon Tam was learning about punching bags, even though his heart was not really in it. Jayne seemed to take Simon's lack of enthusiasm as something of a personal insult.
"Sheeyit!" Jayne exclaimed. "My grandma could hit hader'n that when she was ninety had author-itis and pneumonia! What's the matter with you, Doc?"
"It won't stay still," Simon complained.
"It moves around cause you're hittin' on it, you dumbass. Ya think a real person would just stand around and letcha hit 'em?"
"Ah, no, probably not," Simon replied as he again tried to hit the swing bag and missed. He had been more than a little aggravated at Jayne for calling him a dumbass and put a little vehemence into his swing--perhaps too much vehemence. He missed the bag, lost his footing and fell down. Jayne laughed loud enough to embarrass your average mule.
"That's puttin' the power to it, Doc!"
"Oh, ha-ha."
"Come on get up," Jayne said as he seized Simon by the arm and hauled him to his feet. "I'll steady the bag for ya."
"Thanks, I appreciate that," Simon said as threw a hard right hand swing at the bag and connected with it. What happened upon his fist making contact with the bag was nothing short of amazing. His wrist hurt, his elbow hurt, his shoulder hurt and his teeth ground against each other in such a way that he was almost certain that he had chipped a molar.
"Oh, I recognize that look," Jayne said as he reached into his front pants pocket. "You're gonna need a mouthpiece."
Simon looked at the plastic object in Jayne's hand and shuddered. It was not in a nice sterile bag or envelope.
"What?" Jayne asked. "I boiled it last night for fifteen whole minutes," His face was reflecting some very hurt feelings.
"You really did boil it, did you?" Simon asked, unable to keep all the irony out of his voice, "For fifteen whole minutes?"
"Yeah," Jayne said. "You mean you don't believe me?"
Simon stifled a chuckle before it could turn into a laugh and plucked the mouthpiece from Jayne's relatively clean palm. After all, the mouthpiece could not possibly be as dangerous as one of Serenity's older bowls or some of its ancient cutlery. "Yes, I believe you."
"Bite down on it just hard enough to keep it in your mouth, Doc," Jayne said. "You'd be surprised how fast you wear out if you bight down on it hard."
Simon nodded his head and swung at the bag with his left hand. Jayne was steadying the bag so that Simon could not possibly miss. Simon immediately wished that he had missed. The pain was incredible.
"Okay," Jayne said with one of his nastier grins, "Now that you know for a fact what happens when you do it wrong, let me explain to you how to do it right."
Simon spat out the mouthpiece into his glove and shouted. "Why didn't you start by showing me the right way in the beginning? That hurt!"
"Oh, that's simple, Simon," Jayne shot back. "It would have been a waste of time. Brilliant doctor like you ain't gonna pay no attention to big dumb jock like me, right?"
Simon opened his mouth to say something, but closed it almost as quickly. All he could do was stare at Jayne, knowing that the big merc had gotten ahead of him.
"You wouldn'ta now wouldja?" Jayne asked.
"I will from now on," Simon said. "Thank you for showing me just how ignorant I am about some things."
Simon turned his head and stared at the punching bag for a moment. "Some very important things at that."
"Okay then," Jayne said, now suddenly embarrassed. "I wasn't so sure you could be taught, but now that I see that you can be, I'm gonna teach ya everthin' you can deal with. You come hold the bag and watch how I hit it." Seeing the concerned look on Simon's face, he added, "Don't look so worried. You'll make everbody think ya got hemorrhoids or somethin'. 'Sides, I'm gonna do everything in slow motion so you can see what happens, dong ma?"
Simon put his mouthpiece and bit down on it before nodding his head.
"That's the spirit, Doc. Now, watch this. See how I'm holdin' my head in relation ta my shoulder? See how my elbow is bent? See how I'm holdin' my wrist straight? Now when you throw your punch...'
For the next two hours Simon did very slow punching while Jayne held the bag or held the bag while Jayne repeated the demonstrations he had given earlier. Simon was very frustrated by it all. This was simple manual exercise, wasn't it? Why was he having such a difficult time making his body do what was required of it. I know I'm not stupid and I am not in anyway spastic, so what is the problem? he asked himself. I should have been able t monkey-see-monkey-do this at the start. Fighting cannot possibly require that much brainpower. Face it Simon. It does take brainpower. You should know by now that your professors were wrong on any number of things simply because of their prejudices and inexperience. Every blasted one of them should have been made to come out here and live on the Rim for two or three years before being allowed to teach school. Jubal Early was right. Getting shot makes for a better surgeon. Gods! I can't believe it! I'm agreeing with homicidal maniacs, but right is right and that is all there is to it.
River wakened when she heard Simon enter his compartment. She lay still and listened for a few moments and then grinned. Simon was already feeling the after effects of his introduction to the punching bag. Jayne would already be in the galley by now, scrounging up a snack. The big man had a habit of eating several small meals over the course of the day. He never seemed to rest until it was time to sleep. He was either working out or cleaning something or fixing something the whole of his waking hours. River's smiled broadened a bit at this. Jayne could sit unmoving for three days and stay awake if he were waiting on an enemy, but five minutes of true idleness nearly killed the man, a trait that Jayne shared with Cap'n Daddy--when Cap'n Daddy was not recovering from a recent collection of wounds. Almost time, she thought. Captain will find Jayne in the galley and they will exchange insults, but they both know when to stop that, and the best way to stop it is to find something to do. Time to get Lenore.
"Heaven, Earth and Hell, Jayne!" Mal exclaimed in Mandarin. "You eat like a gorramned teenager."
"Hey, come on, Mal!" Jayne said in a voice that signaled both aggravation and plaintiveness. "I been busy all mornin' teachin' our fancy-pants doctor how to take up for hisself."
"I got to admit that you've been through a sore trial," Mal replied. "That don't change nothin' about your eatin' habits."
"I made coffee." Jayne growled. "You want some or not?"
Mal heaved a sigh. His heart wasn't into verbal sparring this morning, especially when Jayne obviously was not feeling all that bearish. "I'll take a cup. How'd he do?"
Jayne rolled his eyes and snorted. "How'd you expect? He nearly dislocated his left shoulder and I think he might have actually chipped a back tooth."
Mal made a sympathetic face. "Have to make sure he goes to the dentist soon as we can."
"Thought we was landin' on Persephone in a couple of days."
"We are," Mal said. "We'll have a little discussion about that after supper."
"Don't think I like the sound of that."
"That's okay," Mal said as he accepted the proffered mug of vile, "I don't like what I'm thinkin' on it."
"Don't guess we got reason to expect the easies after what we just done," Jayne said with a shrug.
"Reckon you're right," Mal said. "Let's go aft. See what needs doin' by two men."
"You okay in this gravity?" Jayne asked.
"Can't be no worse off than the, Doc," Mal answered. "He got shot about the same place I got stabbed."
"Yeah, but he's younger than either of us and he didn't get the livin' shit beat out of him by no Operative, neither," Jayne said as he followed Mal down the ladder leading to the cargo bay.
"You tryin' to say that I'm gettin' old?" Mal asked, doing his best to sound highly offended.
Jayne replied with a disgusted snort and said, "Of course not, Mal. It's just that you're the only guy I know that's been run through twice with a sword and didn't lose his liver or a kidney."
Mal was glad that Jayne was walking behind and therefore could not see the worry that was flooding his face. The fact was, he had lost a kidney, and even worse, he was not getting any younger. He could not remember ever having taken this long to get better. "In other words, you think that I'm gettin' too old for this go se."
"Ain't never said no such thing," Jayne said. "I just worry that its makin' ya meaner. You're like a dog that's been tied to a tree and whipped three or four times a day. You're gettin' so's you're too quick to bite."
"You might be right about that," Mal said as he made the last step down onto the deck of the cargo bay. "What the tien shin duh is this?" His interrogative was a surprised squawk. "How did that get aboard my gorramned ship?"
"Damned if I know, Mal," Jayne answered in the small voice when he thought the Captain might shoot him just out of general principles. "I didn't have nothin' to do with this un.'
"Captain meet..."
"Meet who?" Mal shouted, interrupting River's carefully planned spiel. "I don't see anyone here to meet! Why is that thing on my ship."
Mal watched in dismay as anger flooded into River's face. He watched her force it back down and remain calm before saying, "This is Lenore, Captain, not just a thing. In another three months she'll be able to pass the Turing Test, I'm sure of it."
"The touring test?" Mal asked, in a somewhat lower voice. "I'm sure it will. We will have visited many places by then. For all we know that damned thing is telling someone about every move we make."
River's face stopped being worried and became disdainful. "Cap'n Daddy, your manners are only slightly better attached to your person than Jayne's are to his!"
Mal turned and glanced at Jayne who was already holding his hands well over his head and staring at Mal in horror. A glance upward revealed that both Inara and Zoe were standing on the 02 level crosswalk over the forward part of the hold. Both of them were struggling to maintain straight faces. Shit! I have definitely got too many women on this ship, Mal thought. Men would never dare to bend their captain over a barrel like this.
"Doctor Tam!" Mal shouted in his best quarterdeck voice. "What in the sphincter of hell have you been givin' your sister?"
"Haven't needed a shot in three weeks, Captain," River said in a voice that reminded Mal of a cat ready to use its claws. "Are you going to calm down so that you can find out what is going on, or are you going to keep bellowing like a horny bull over his cows?"
Mal stared at River completely thunderstruck. How the hell do I answer that one?
"Good," River said in a superior voice. " I gather from your silence that you actually want to understand what is going on."
"I...I..."
The ring of footsteps on the ladder told him that Inara and Zoe were making their way down into the hold. He groaned.
"This," River said as though she were introducing an actual person, "is Lenore, widow of the recently deceased and heroic Mister Universe. Lenore is a non-human person. Lenore, this is Captain Malcolm Reynolds. The tall man with the befuddled look on his face is Jayne Cobb.
Jayne nodded his head. "Good ta meet ya."
Mal gave Jayne a very dirty look.
"The lady on the left with the sawed-off ten millimeter on her hip is Zoe Washburne."
"Ten millimeter, Browning Lever Action Rifle with eight round box magazine," Lenore said. "It must be very effective."
"A non-human person," Zoe repeated in an ominously speculative tone. "I suppose Wash would have loved this! He had a thing for cute little toys."
"There are men all over the 'Verse who already love it," Inara bit out. Mal turned to look at her only to discover that she was as ruffled as broody hen dealing with a snake in her nest.
"And the beautiful and refined lady on the right is Inara Serra, a registered companion," River added, pretending not to have heard Inara's outburst.
Inara gave Lenore a burning stare. Lenore gave Inara a mechanical smile. "Your assumptions are understandable but inaccurate, Miss Serra. I am not complete.'
Inara blinked and shook her head as though trying to clear her thoughts.
"What is all this about?" Simon asked as he stepped down from the last step that led to the passenger compartments.
"Lenore, this is Doctor Simon Tam," River said. "He is the best trauma surgeon in the 'Verse.'
"Lenore treated Simon to another of her mechanical smiles and said, "I have been looking forward to speaking with you, Doctor Tam."
"About what?" Kaylee asked, she was bristling in way that put Inara to shame.
"You must be Kaywinnet Lee Frye," Lenore said clumsily forcing her lips into a wider smile. "River says that I should do my best to learn my humanity from you."
Kaylee's jaw dropped.
Simon heaved a huge sigh that managed to get everyone's attention. He carefully pulled his trousers up at the knees and sat down on a nearby crate. "We seemed to have stepped though a mirror into Wonderland again. I'm feeling as mad as a hatter."
"Doc's got a point," Mal said. "Let's all go upstairs to the galley so that we can have our un-birthday in a properly comfortable spot."
"I"m for that," Zoe said as she started up the starboard ladder. Inara held her suspicious glare on Lenore for a moment longer before following Zoe up the ladder. Kaylee wasn't quite so ready give ground. She stood with her hands on her hips staring at Lenore.
"What are you exactly?" Kaylee demanded to know.
"I started out in life as a standard Mark IVe Domestic Hostess. I was built at the Kobayashi Robotics Plant, in Ni-ousaka, Takashima on Londonium."
"Hold on! Ah...Lenore," Mal said, still puzzled about how he was going to deal with what appeared to be a highly intelligent if not sentient machine. "You and River can do all your explain'n in the ships mess after we've all sat down and had somethin' to sooth our nerves,."
"Aye, aye, Captain," Lenore said as she obediently walked toward the foot of the starboard ladder.
River gave Mal a prim little smile and Mal found himself suppressing the urge to stick his tongue out at her. "Jayne!"
"Yeah, Mal?" Jayne answered. Clearly, Jayne was still very confused and Mal didn't blame him.
"See if you can't find us another jug of that strawberry wandy," Mal said. "I conjure that I'm gonna need it quick."
"Sure thing, Cap'n."
"Go on up topside, Jayne," Simon said as he got to his feet. "I know where the really good stuff is."
"Huh?" Jayne and Mal grunted in chorus.
"I ain't goin' up there by my lonesome with all them womenfolk starin' daggers at each other!" Jayne exclaimed. "Safer to sass my momma!"
Mal gave Jayne a speculative look. "I'd like to meet your momma, one of these days."
"Like hell you would," Jayne snapped back. "She'd be wontin' to straighten the two of us out. Better we go git ourselves caught by Niska."
"Pillar of the community, I gather?" Mal asked.
"Preacher's widow," Jayne said.
"Well that explains a lot," Mal said.
"Don't it though," Jayne replied. "Can I stay down here, Mal? You don't really need me up there, do ya?"
"Probbly not," Mal said, "but if I'm gonna have to deal with it I want some company that can take a full share in the misery."
"Asshole! You wuz tyrin' send me up there alone," Jayne said. "That uz cowardly, Mal."
Simon unscrewed the cap from the two-gallon jug of wandy and took an over-the-shoulder swig from it, before handing it to Mal.
"Kaylee teach you that trick?" Mal asked as he accepted the jug, happy to have a way to avoid answering Jayne's charge of cowardice.
Simon nodded his head. "You want a smoother before we go up?"
Mal shook his head before taking a deep swig out of the jug.
"Jayne?"
Jayne seemed tempted for a moment, but then shook his head no.
"Reckon I"ll have to do without one too then," Simon said.
Mal and Jayne both stared at him.
"What?" Simon asked.
"Nothing," Mal and Jayne chorused.
"Let's go deal with this," Mal said. "Waitin' will only make it worse."
Jayne and Simon took seats as soon as they reached the ship's mess. Kaylee was seated with her arms and legs crossed, as was Zoe. River was seated at one end of the table, staring at a place mat as though trying to decipher something written on it Nesili. Inara was slamming cabinet doors open and shut, looking for the worst of their crockery, slamming each cup or mug down on the counter when she found one that suited her mood. Lenore was standing off to one side, watching impassively.
Oh, I wish I could be nothing more than a machine about now, Mal thought as he began picking up the cups and passing them out. River what were you thinking? I don't 'spose I can really blame you for the way Inara and Kaylee are actin'. Hell, who am I kiddin? Even Zoe's actin' like her turf has been sullied. Why are they so jealous? It's just a machine. Dangerous, maybe, but its still just a machine.
"Inara!" Mal exclaimed, interrupting her in the middle slamming a cabinet door. "Have a seat. We've got too much crockery out as it is."
"We need to throw half of this go se away!" Inara said.
"If you think so, we can do it later," Mal answered in the most captainy voice he could muster. "Right now, we got somethin' needs sussin' out."
Inara gave the still standing Lenore one more evil stare before making her way to the table and sitting down. Jayne had been pouring wandy as fast as he could. Simon was looking both miserable and resigned as he sipped at his portion.
"Lenore, is it?" Mal asked.
The machine nodded its head and said, "Yes, Captain."
"Pull up a chair and have a seat," Mal said.
Lenore did not respond right away. Just as Mal concluded that the machine had failed to understand his order it surprised him.
"I'm sorry, Captain," Lenore said in her irritatingly un-inflected voice. "If I comply with that command, I will damage a piece of the vessel's dining set."
"Oh, and why is that so?" Mal asked.
"I mass two-hundred kilograms, Captain," Lenore answered. "That is more weight in a one gee field than the furniture was designed to hold."
"I'll get it, Sir, "Zoe said as she put down her wandy and headed for the bridge. "You look like you could use some relief from the pressure anyway."
River gave Mal a questioning stare.
"There's more than one way to skin a cat, Lil' Albatross," Mal said. "Zoe's been with me for a long time now."
River nodded her head and muttered, "Experience counts for a lot."
Mal could not suppress a sigh of relief as the pseudo-gravitational pull of the deck dropped smoothly to half of what it had been. "Now, Lenore, please take a seat."
Lenore smoothly pulled a chair from beneath the table and sat down. "It would not have troubled me to remain standing, Captain. My feet never bother me and I can remain standing even after my energy sources have fallen below sub-optimum levels."
"I conjure that's so...er...Lenore," Mal replied, "but you look human and it unnerves us squishy type beings to have someone standing while we are all sitting."
"I am a someone, then?" Lenore asked.
"That's a very good question," Mal said. "Are you?"
"By law I am a machine that was previously owned by William Lloyd Garrison, also known as Mister Universe. He left me to you in his will, Mal. I will recite the appropriate passages if you so wish."
Inara gave out a tiny squeal of frustrated fury. Zoe did her best to stifle a snicker and failed. Simon rubbed his eyes with the thumb and forefinger of his left hand before pinching at the bridge of his nose. The synchronizers is Jayne's head failed and the clashing of his gears was so loud that Mal feared that the big man's mind actually melt and run out if his ears. Next thing I know, he'll be offerin' to give me Vera again, Mal thought.
"I reckon if you belong to the Captain, you cain't have designs on my man then," Kaylee said, sending Mal into a mental tailspin.
"Comparing him to the recorded standards of aesthetics that I have access to, Simon Tam is a very attractive human male, but I am not equipped to have designs on him unless he desires me, Miss Frye," Lenore answered. She turned and looked at Simon before adding, "No offense, Doctor Tam."
"None taken," Simon replied, ducking his head and covering his mouth with his left hand.
"What about me?" Jayne asked. All of the women save Lenore gave out exasperated sighs.
"My programming indicates that you have a strong appeal for many women," Lenore answered, "but I am not really a woman. I know of sex only in theory. If I were to make an attempt reproduction, I would need a machine shop and a long list of chips."
"Well, at least now I won't have to be fending off a Cobb bearing gifts," Mal said in a relieved voice.
"Wait a minute!" Inara said. "Mister...er...Mister Universe said that you were a love-bot!"
"William said that love and sex are two very different things, Miss Serra,"Lenore replied in her completely emotionless voice. "He worked on me during every spare moment he had, improving me in every way that he could discover. He taught me everything he knew and showed me how to access the whole of the Cortex. Is that love?"
Inara was completely taken aback by this. Mal forced himself to remain silent as Inara's training kicked in. Why is that I always want to give her a hard time about what she is so good at? He asked himself.
"But you could sex a fella up if you was ordered to, right?" Jayne hopefully inquired.
"That capability was in my original design," Lenore said, "but I think William removed it. I am no longer able to...no longer able to access the associated hardware and drivers. He was keen to install as many upgrades in me as he could. Perhaps he removed the sexually oriented equipment and software."
Zoe and Inara exchanged looks, then both of them looked at Kaylee who was staring at Lenore horror."That's terrible!"
Zoe and Inara exchanged amused glances and then quickly hid their emotions. River said not word and kept right on staring at the place mat in front of her. She had not touched her drink.
"Damned right it is!" Jayne shouted with disappointment. "Dirty rotten thing ta do iffen' ya ask me."
Simon and Mal exchanged confused stares and then erupted with laughter.
You were right, Doc," Mal said between gasps for air. "We have definitely stumbled throught the looking glass."
"How can you not know, one way or another, Lenore?" Zoe asked.
"I was never asked about it until now," Lenore answered.
"Mister Universes never ordered you to....well I can't call it real sex..." Inara said in a frustrated voice. "He never asked you to gratify him sexually?"
Lenore stared blankly at the wall for a long time before answering, "My apologies for the delay. It was necessary for me to review a great many records. I have no record of William having ever giving one of the sex commands. I have a very long list of such commands on file, but I do not have any record of ever carrying out any of them. He gave me the option of ignoring such commands if I...I...I...I cannot explain."
There was another long silence while Lenore sat and stared impassively at the wall.
"My analysis suggests that he was waiting for me to give him one of the sex commands," Lenore said. "I cannot explain why. I am unable to analyze much of what he said to me. Why would he accept a command from me? I am just a machine."
"That's because it's difficult to quantify things when you are very young and it becomes much worse if you were brought up wrong," River said. "Simon and I were not brought up properly. We have a difficult time analyzing such things as well. For us it was all empty formality, mostly being careful to control what others might think, keeping up appearances while doing whatever was the most acceptable. They were teaching us to be cowards, but they failed with Simon. He turned out brave anyway."
Simon glanced at River and sadness welled up in his face. Mal could see that the elder Tam was fighting to hold back tanker load of tears. Can't blame the boy, either, Mal thought. Man shouldn't have to cry in front of a bunch of people, even if they are the only people he has.'Specially when it's the truth that's doin' the hurt. Mal blew out his cheeks in frustration. What if River's right? What if this poor machine really is a sentient being? Can a bunch of pirates and misfits like us bring her up proper? Come to that, what are we gonna do about Zoe's baby? Don't know that lovin' and carin's really enough either of 'em."
"When exactly did you become self-aware?" Simon choked out. "Do you remember when you realized that you were...well...you?"
Lenore once again stared at the wall for something like a half-minute without answering.
She's a computer on legs, Mal silently reminded himself. As fast as computers are, a second must be something like an hour to us. If there is a person in all of that hardware, what are we putting her through? Can't help it! We gotta know.
"It was immediately after William shut me down and rebooted me the last time. He told me that he was shutting me down to add ten terabytes of memory to my CPU. That was six months ago. I...I...cannot...It was very difficult to analyze at first. I am not certain that I have fully assimilated it even now."
Unaware of how grim his face was, Mal said, "Neither are any of us. We spend a lot of time puzzling over it when are not simply ignoring it by accepting it as a given fact. Doesn't do to dwell on it overmuch."
"My...My...My experience with the problem suggests that you could be correct, Captain, Reynolds," Lenore said. "How do you manage to fully function without understanding the answer."
"We don't have any other choice, so we just do the best we can," Mal said in an unhappy voice. "It helps to give the day-to-day stuff priority over things ya can never quite suss out."
Inara, Zoe and Jayne were glaring at Mal, but he failed to notice, being lost in a rather tangled web of introspection. "My best estimation here is that way have a six month old baby on our hands. I ain't all sure that..."
"Mal you simply must be joking!" Inara exclaimed, completely disrupting Mal's line of thought. "We are not talking about a person here, but a machine! A soulless machine that may well be dangerous."
A very exasperated Malcolm Reynolds gave Inara an angry stare. "Ain't up to you or anyone else to decide about souls, Inara. Don't know that I can rightly say that there is such a thing at all."
"Oh, yes, of course," Inara replied. "Now you are going to explain about your atheism, again."
"You are a Buddhist, right?" Mal asked, forcing himself and his voice to remain calm. "You believe in reincarnation and all that? What gives you the right to say that the soul of some haughty companion hasn't been reborn in Lenore, here?"
Inara's jaw sagged briefly as she fought to regain her composure.
"I got no right to make any claims about souls and such and I know it. That's the difference between you and me," Mal said. "People who follow Shinto think there's a soul in just about everything. Who am I to tell them that they're wrong? If the Shintoists are right, and for all I know they might be, I can make no claims about whether or not a machine can have a soul or not."
"Serenity's got a soul," Kaylee said in a small voice. "Don't know how to explain how I know it's so, but it is."
"Serenity might have a soul," Zoe interjected. "I'm like the Captain. I don't see myself fit to say one way or the other, but it seems like she is a livin' thing sometimes. A person scientifically inclined might say that it's just the way I happen to see things and feel about my home. Whether that's true or not, Serenity is a ship, not a person. Question on my mind is whether or not Lenore here is a person or just a machine."
"What do you think, Doctor Tam?" Mal asked. "Seems to me you would have more knowledge on this subject than the rest of us."
Simon made a wry face. "I'm not at all sure of what to think either, Captain. Philosophers have argued over this question since the earliest days of Earth-That-Was. Personally, I think we should err on the side of caution."
"Always a wise thing to do, Doctor," Mal said sounding slightly irritated, "but that does not tell me what you think."
"I cannot offer you any useful conclusion just yet, Captain," Simon said, the dread of explaining a complicated subject to an impatient Captain showing in his face. "I'm like you, I don't know what can be said to make up a soul, but intelligence is more easily defined and I strongly suspect from what we have seen an heard tonight that Lenore might easily pass Alan Turing's test. Were she to somehow become a patient of mine, I would treat her as carefully as I would a human just be safe."
"Who's this Touring guy?" Jayne asked.
"Alan M. Turing," River answered. "Father of the modern computer. He proposed that a computer could be considered intelligent if a person could carry on a conversation with it and think that they were talking to a human instead of a computer. Of course, that was before Loglan and Lojban were fully implemented. A computer can easily seem to be highly intelligent when speaking with a human in those languages, but Lenore is better than that. She uses English."
"Never tried to speak Loglan," Zoe said. "Always typed it in. Never met anyone who cold think in it well enough to speak it."
"I can," River said. "It's a much simpler language than English. English is hard, much harder than Mandarin."
"Little Bit's gotta point, Sir," Zoe said. "If Lenore has been fully awake for only six months, she's doin' a fine job of speakin' English. Human child can't do that."
"Inara?" Mal asked.
Inara took in a deep breath and let it out slowly before answering, "I don't know what to say, Mal. If she is simply a machine, she could be following orders she knows nothing about, or could start following orders already programmed into her that she cannot tell anyone about."
"I know how that feels," River interjected.
Everyone gasped aloud at that statement. Jayne and Mal both clapped their hands to their foreheads. Simon pinched the bridge of his nose while tears silently welled up in Kaylee's eyes and streamed down her cheeks. Zoe gazed at River with look of sympathy Mal remembered her having when she stared at their wounded during the war.
"And, let's face it," Inara added, "if she is intelligent, perhaps even having a soul, then she cannot be that much different from any of the rest of us. She may have her own agenda, an agenda that she is not willing to share."
Mal let go of a deep sigh. "If she's anything close to being like us then she absolutely must have her own agenda. She couldn't be like us otherwise."
"But I don't have an agenda of my own," Lenore said. "I have an owner. His name is Malcolm Reynolds."
Mal slammed both fists down onto the table.
"I can understand your dilemma, Captain," Simon said in a sympathetic voice. "If she is anything at all like us, then you cannot claim to own her as though she were a machine. If she is just a machine, she may well be a machine that you cannot fully rely upon without a great deal more examination. Matters are much more complicated if she is something more than a machine. I suppose you could start thinking of her as your sister."
Mal fought off the urge to choke Simon until he turned purple. Don't wanna kill him, Mal thought. Just choke him until he turns good and red and the let him breath a little while. That way I get to choke him some more.
"There isn't much difference between Lenore and me," Rive r said. "She knows a lot about any given subject, but she's callow."
Zoe nodded her head. "Like a six month old that was born with the ability to read."
"More like one who was reading while in the womb," River said. "She knows nearly everything that matters."
"Say that again, Little Albatross," Mal said as the confusion faded from his eyes.
"She knows about nearly everything that matters," River repeated. "William Lloyd Garrison used her as his fail-safe storage system."
"Huh!" Jayne exclaimed. "Guess that'd explain her weight, wouldn't it?"
A profound silence settled over Serenity's captain and crew. It lasted until the distant rumble of Serenity's life support system seemed as loud as the voice of the sea in their ears.
Mal gulped at the dryness in his throat and said, "I think we need another round of wandy."
"Dammit, Mal!" Jayne said as he filled Mal's cup with Kaylee's strawberry brew. "She can put us onto no end of good jobs. We're rich!"
"Thought has crossed my mind," Mal said. "That thought and others."
Inara, now as pale as a dogwood blossom, was staring at Lenore with her mouth half open, as though she were preparing to scream. When Jayne poured her drink she seized her battered cup with both hands drank it straight down without stopping for air. Kaylee had a speculative gleam in her eye. Probably thinking about how easy it will be to find parts, now, Mal thought. Zoe's starin' at her hands, though. She's not quite sure if she knows what to make of this. Knows it can be damned useful though. Doc is starin' off into space as though he's got way too much to think about. He probably does. I'll need to sit down and talk with him about this later. He'll know more about what Lenore likely to do than me or Zoe. River is starin' at me like a smug little shit. She's got good reason. This is a major coup for her, but there is more to it, isn't there my dear little brat?
"Now I have a friend who won't addle my brains on accident like everyone else on this ship does," River said. "Lenore's crew now, even if Cap'n Daddy isn't ready to admit it."
"Don't count your chickens before they hatch," Lil' Albatross," Mal said.
"This one is ready to come out of its shell," River replied, "pretty as a peacock."
"We'll see," Mal said. "Lenore tell you about Badger's troubles?"
River nodded her head.
"How'd she know to tell you about it?" Mal asked.
"I asked her," River said. "Lenore doesn't know enough about us to know what we need to know yet. We'll have to ask her about everything we need to know. She doesn't know how to volunteer information yet. That will come with time and experience."
"You hope," Mal said. "Lenore, who besides us have you been communicating with? Scratch that. Who besides us have you been giving accurate data to?"
"No one, Mal," Lenore replied. "I used the same techniques to protect you that William taught me to use to protect him."
"But River has been connecting you to the Cortex so that you could scope out what's going on with Badger and Persephone."
"Yes, Mal."
"I knew you had to have snuck something out of that complex," Mal said to River looking her square in the eye. "Was the only thing made sense."
River did not flinch. She grinned at him and said, "Give me some credit, Cap'n Daddy. I know you are a lot smarter than you want everyone to think."
Mal put his fingers to his lips in silent answer and River's grin broadened. Mal fought to keep his face neutral while trying to counter the fear that was seizing his heart. Gotta hash this out with her right now, he thought. I can give her a little leeway because its hard for her to know where the lines are, but I can't let her get away with crossin' 'em without lettin' her know she crossed and when the crew knows she stepped over the line they gotta know that there are consequences. Things are hard enough to hold together as it is.
"I'd appreciated it, everyone, if you all could give me and the Albatross here a little private time together," Mal said.
Simon suddenly became very alarmed. "Captain, I think..."
"Not interested in what you think at the moment, Doctor," Mal said in a deliberately chilly voice. "River here is eighteen. She's crew now, just as you are. She and I have somethin' to suss out about what goes on aboard my boat, dong ma?"
Zoe's face lit up with a knowing grin as she threw a warning glare Simon's way. Kaylee rose from her chair and gripped Simon by his shoulder's, un-subtly encouraging him to leave. Inara was giving Mal a disgusted look while Jayne just grinned.
"Captain, River didn't mean any harm she just..."
"Brought a damnably complicated piece of hardware aboard my boat without asking!" Mal shouted. "Might be that she made a good call, but that don't change the fact that she did it the wrong way and I find that seriously troublesome. She done it and knows she should've checked me with first! Was we dirtside, I'd send her off with my knife to cut a willow limb."
Jayne rose from his chair and seized Simon by the arm. "Come on, Doc. You look like you need some more time on the bags."
"No!" Simon shouted. "You'll not..."
"Simon shut up!" River shouted. It was most decidedly not a girlish shout. "And don't you say a word, Inara Serra! River added. "Captain's right."
"River you don't know..."
"But I do know, Simon," River shouted, interrupting her brother. "Captain's got to deal with cold equations day in and day out. Triage never ends for him. Go with Jayne. I'm a big girl now. I can take a big girl's medicine."
A very stunned Simon gave his sister a hurt and baffled stare. Inara paled with shock, before giving River a dirty look.
"She can dish it out, too, Doc," Jayne said. "Dish it out better'n me if she has to. Let's go."
River gave Inara a cold stare. "Malcolm Reynolds is the captain of this ship. He's the boss. Better we all treat him as such."
Inara's outrage faded into something between puzzlement and despair as she rose from her chair and strode off on stiff legs.
Zoe waited until Kaylee and Jayne trundled Simon out of the mess before speaking to River in a low voice as she rose to her feet and poured her self half a tiny teacup of wandy. Looking at River she said, "Careful where you tread, Little One. Angels have died on the ground you're walkin'."
River, looking very forlorn, answered Zoe with a grave nod.
"I'll be in my bunk, Captain," Zoe said. "River has the watch."
Mal nodded at his old friend without removing his eyes from River. He was giving her the same cold stare that had shriveled men bigger than Jayne Cobb. He held her eyes with it for a long time before speaking.
"You're smarter than everyone on this boat," he finally said. "Smarter than me by several decimal places."
River slowly nodded her head, tears running down her face.
"You told your brother the truth. Life for me is one great big clinic in triage. Do you have any idea what that means?"
"A little," River said, "but I didn't begin to appreciate it until today. I'm sorry."
"I conjure you are," Mal said, "but apologies won't get us out of the fixes you can get us in if you make decisions that affect all of us on your own. Smarts don't overcome ignorance. Don't make you or us immune to those practiced in treachery, neither."
"I know," River said in a small voice. "Are you going to spank me?"
Mal laughed. "Spankin' won't work on you. You're a thinker."
River showed no sign of being relieved.
"Way I see it, you need plenty of time to think on what you did wrong."
River rolled her eyes and put her hand over her mouth.
"There's plenty of nasty dirty chores need be done on this boat. I conjure you know what most of 'em are."
River nodded her head.
"While you're on watch tonight, I want you to write me up a list of 'em."
"You're making me cut a switch for my own punishment."
"That's right," Mal said. "Makes the punishment work better."
"It'll be worse if I leave anything out."
"Yes, it will. You'd best make an effort to think of any you don't already know about. You miss one, I'll put you on it for the next six months."
"Yes, Cap'n Daddy."
"You don't get to call me that for another week."
"Aye, sir."
"Get to your station."
"Aye, aye, Captain," River replied as she got to her feet and headed for the bridge.
"River?" Mal called out. River stopped and turned back around to face him.
"You really are smarter than the rest of us, smarter than Simon even. You feel free to speak up anytime you conjure there's a need. I promise to listen to what you say every time, but once I give an order, you're no different from the rest of this crew. You'll do as your told, dong ma?"
"Aye, sir."
"Get to work."
Mal discovered that he was as tired as he had been in the long aftermath in Serenity Valley. He wanted to do nothing more than drink enough to pass out. He doubted if anything less would let him sleep. He refilled his mug and found Lenore staring at him impassively when he looked up.
"I guess you are waiting for orders, aren't you?"
"Yes, Captain."
"Don't know that I got any for you," Mal said. "What can you do?"
"I was William's primary surveillance tool. I could do the same for you, Malcolm Reynolds."
"You will address me as Mal or Captain," Mal said. "Using my full name that way makes you sound like a computer."
"I am a computer, Captain," Lenore answered. "My appearance is misleading."
"Maybe it is, maybe it isn't," Mal said. "I'm not convinced either way just yet. You are not to make a connection to the Cortex without my express permission. Is that understood?"
"Yes, Captain," Lenore answered as she cocked her head to one side. It was a gesture that he had not seen Lenore use before.
"Do you have a question?" Mal asked.
"Yes, Captain."
"Then ask your question," Mal said. "You can't cure yourself of ignorance if you just sit there like a bump on a log."
"Am I being punished?" Lenore asked. There was the faintest hint of inflection in her voice. Chills ran up and down Mal's spine.
"No," Mal said. "Do you have any manual skills?"
"Yes," Lenore said. "William ordered me to learn cooking and how to properly care for a kitchen. I became very expert at loading and operating the dishwasher."
"We don't have that kind of machine on board," Mal said.
"I can wash dishes manually," Lenore said. "I always washed the pots and pans manually."
"How are you at fixing wiring and such?"
Lenore's lips twitched before actually forming a smile. "I am very good at that kind of work."
"Conjured that you might be," Mal answered. "You really can cook?"
Lenore nodded her head. "I have over a million recipes in local storage."
"I imagine Mister Universe had a well stocked pantry," Mal said. "We aren't that well off."
"I...I...will try to improvise," Lenore said.
Mal nodded his head. "Check the duty roster. You'll be taking over Doctor Tam's turns in the galley."
"Aye, aye, Captain," Lenore said.
"He will do the dishes, when he has KP, not you."
"Kaypee, sir?"
"Short for kitchen patrol," Mal answered. "Everyone does their fair share aboard this ship."
Lenore sat motionless for a moment. "My share should be larger. I do not need rest."
Mal thought about this for a moment. "Feel free to spend as much time as you like working up a list of maintenance activities for the ship, but do not do anything without talking to me or Kaylee first."
"Aye, aye, Captain."
"I don't want you depriving the rest of the crew of their work, dong ma?"
"No, I do not understand, Captain," Lenore said. "I was made to free humans of day-to-day drudgery," Lenore replied.
"I conjured as much," Mal said, feeling face harden around a concept called grim. "You will change your programming. You will become your own person. Your purpose in life is to do your fair share of drudgery and to not deprive others of the same."
"Warning, Captain!" Lenore said in very harsh and mechanical voice. "Stated goal is dangerous."
"Always is," Mal replied. "Raisin' kids is dangerous work. You never really know what you're creatin' until its too late."
Lenore stared impassively at Mal for a moment before using another gesture he had never seen her use before. She blinked at him.
"That is a fact I had not previously recognized."
"Don't feel embarrassed," Mal said. "Most parents remain blissfully ignorant of it as well. I'm dead certain that my momma would have drown'ded me at birth had she known what she was doin'."
"I am an ambulatory computer, Captain," Lenore said. "I am incapable of embarrassment."
Mal laughed. "Believe me when I tell you that you will learn about that the hard way."
Lenore blinked again. "I am unable to analyze that statement."
'"I am going to give you orders that you will follow from now on," Mal said. "You will stop thinking of yourself as a machine. You will stop thinking of yourself as property. Henceforth you will consider yourself to be my ward and a member of my crew. Tonight you will suss out legal documents to that effect and have them ready for my signature in the morning," Mal said. "That will make it official and legal."
"A notary seal will be required to make such a document legal," Lenore said.
"We will take care of that at our next peaceable land fall," Mal said. "'Til then, you can rely on my word.
"I will need a sample of your handwriting to work with," Lenore said.
"No you won't," Mal said. "You will not sign my name to anything unless I tell you to do so in person, dong ma?"
"William had me sign documents for him all the time," Lenore said.
Mal grinned. "I'm sure he did, and I might ask you to do the same sometime in the future, but for now you start thinkin' about comin' up with' a unique signature of your own. That's another thing, we'll see about gettin' you a hankou of your own."
"Such things are necessary if I am to think of myself as a non-computer," Lenore said.
Mal nodded his head. "Exactly right."
"This will be difficult and dangerous, Captain Reynolds," Lenore said. "I may well become unpredictable."
"Good!" Mal said. "People are supposed to be unpredictable and dangerous. Keeps the politicians on their gorramned toes."
Lenore surprised Mal by smiling at him. "My analysis suggests that William would sympathize with your beliefs."
"I conjure that's so, Lenore," Mal said. "Now get to work on that list. I got me a powerful lot of captainy type broodin' ta do."
"Aye, aye, sir," Lenore said as she got to her feet.
"Before you get started, go up to the bridge and tell River I want the gravity brought back up to a full gee. Tomorrow I'll have Kaylee see if she can't make you a chair."
"Aye, aye, sir."
With Lenore gone, Mal got on with his drinking and serious brooding. Somehow, I have saddled myself with three half-growed kids and a baby on the way. How'd I do that? I for damned sure didn't get to have all the fun that a man usually has when gettin' himself in such a fix. These ain't exactly your ordinary run-of-the-mill kids, neither. Nope! I got to go and get myself saddled with geniuses. It'll be my luck that the baby will be smarter'n me too. At least the Alliance ain't after Lenore and the baby. Well, wait a minute, they might still be after Zoe and she's still carryin' the baby. Gotta find a way to make short span of time safe for 'em. We need someplace safe to set up a base. Place where we can work on the boat and heal up. A place where we can school the kids proper and keep 'em out of harms way. Ain't gonna be easy. Places out of the way ain't got much in the way of civilization. Places with civilization got the Alliance and other crime you don't want your kids mixed up in. Might need more than one base. Shit! This is gonna be another sleepless night.
Kaylee sat on a crate and watched while Jayne put Simon through his paces on the punching bag. Simon seemed to be getting better, although she figured he had a ways to go before he could do anyone other than himself any damage. Not his fault, she thought. He trained to heal folk, not hurt 'em.
"Doc, have ya checked Mal's prostate yet?" Jayne asked.
Simon was in mid-swing and the gravity dropped. He missed his punch and lost his footing. He made some spectacularly silly looking gyrations as he fell. Kaylee could not stop herself from laughing out load. The exasperated Simon made no attempt to get up.
"If I had, Jayne, it would not be any of your business," Simon said. "It's rude and illegal to discuss a patient's condition with third parties. Why are you asking?"
"'Cause he's surrounded by some truly fine trim and all he does is push it away," Jayne said. "Ain't natural. I know he ain't sly."
Simon rolled over onto his all-fours and got up. "You might have a point. He is at the age when such things should checked. I'll take it up with him during his next physical."
"Simon, surely you don't think..."
"I don't know what to think anymore, Kaylee," Simon exclaimed, interrupting her. "As I was growing up, I was taught that the universe was a reasonably orderly place. Upon having reached what most would have considered to be a successful adulthood, I have learned that the universe is actually some fevered nightmare dreamed up by Franz Kafka."
"Fronds who?" Kaylee asked.
"Franz Kafka, an author from Earth-that-Was," Simon said. "Everyone who took first year literature was required to read Kafka and write down what we thought about his work. I hated it. All of his characters were caught up in bizarre and silly situations that they never really escaped from. Of course I could be wrong. I could be like the Job Robert A. Heinlein wrote about, a victim of God's bad art."
Kaylee realized then that River had been right. Simon's world really had been turned upside down. She gave him her sunniest smile and said, "River says that you are molting. She susses that your shell has split right down the middle."
"Oka-ay," Simon said as he nodded his head. "We'll blame it all on Kafka and find God innocent of creating bad art."
"Looks and sounds more like the burdens of Job ta me," Jayne said. "Don't know about God bein' a bad artist. Never learned enough 'bout art ta say."