It was night time on Serenity. Of course, in space "night" meant all the lights were turned down low. River lay awake, staring at the ceiling. Her wide, spooky eyes would have given anyone watching her the impression she was in a far off place inside her own head. "Anyone" would have been wrong.

She was watching the dreams in other people's heads.

Zoe was having happy dreams of Wash. In her dreams, they had a baby.

Jayne was dreaming about being in a "nice" lounge. He was surrounded by scantily clad, impossibly beautiful women. They all sat on couches made of money and drank from glasses that were also made of money. Dreams didn't have to make sense. River smiled at the fact that Jayne was still wearing a T-shirt, work pants, and heavy utility belt loaded with weapons, ammo, and a hand grenade.

Mal was dreaming about Miranda. Over and over, he crippled the Operative and played the signal telling the galaxy what their leaders had done. Each time he pushed play, someone he cared about died. First, Sheppard Book. Then, Wash. Next, Zoe. Inara. River. Simon. The faces kept changing, a lot of the people River didn't recognize, but every time he just pushed PLAY.

Simon and Kaylee were asleep in Kaylee's bunk. River could sense what they were doing before they went to bed. She'd asked Simon about it, but Simon found the whole idea of his sister spying on her with his girlfriend disturbing. River wasn't quite sure why, but she never broached the subject again. She had considered asking Kaylee about it, but didn't know if she would be as upset.

Now, Kaylee was dreaming about a giant dinner table. She sat there with the whole crew of Serenity, eating chocolate covered strawberries the size of softballs while every talked and laughed. In her dream, everyone was dressed nice. Also, she was popping the strawberries into her mouth and eating them like normal sized ones. River was a bit confused about the mechanics of it.

Simon was dreaming about being back on his home planet. In his dream, he was accepting a lifetime achievement award for his work as Osiris' best trauma surgeon. Kaylee and River were in attendance. Simon had finally married Kaylee and she was pregnant. River felt a sharp pang of guilt for taking her brother away from that life.

Inara didn't dream. River had asked her about it once, and Inara had said it was because of her Companion training.

"I meditate every day so when I sleep, my mind rests as well as my body," she had said. River wished Inara would teach her that trick so she could keep her mind as calm and focused.

River tried picking up Victor's dreams, but he didn't have any. He was almost comatose. Simon had said only part of that was due to the alcohol. The man had been exhausted to the point of collapsing, even without the drink.

No, he didn't say that, River corrected herself. He thought it. River was getting better at differentiating what was happening in people's heads and what was real, but sometimes things just snuck up on her. It was still too easy for her to get the two mixed up.

At least, this time she wasn't mistaking a grenade for a pretty flower that needs the petals plucked off.

Victor was unconscious for the better part of the next day as well. River played nurse to Simon as she did from time to time. She liked helping. Simon never had bad thoughts about her, though his thoughts sometimes reminded her of all she'd cost him. Besides, it felt good to help people instead of killing them.

Simon was worried about Victor and started running electrolytes and vitamins into his IV as well.

"If he keeps up like this he should be fine," Simon said in his professional, "doctor" voice. River liked hearing her brother talk. He got lost in his own thoughts sometimes when he was treating a patient and it was easy to lose track of whether he was speaking or thinking.

"Human beings are resilient," River said, continuing what he'd been going to say.

"That's right," Simon said. "It's hard to kill people unless you do it just right. Then it becomes entirely too easy." This time River lost track of whether Simon was speaking of thinking.

River focused on her brother's mouth and changed the subject. "He's cute." Maybe that would make it easier. Also, she knew from experience that treating patients sometimes caused Simon to start thinking too much about what had been done to his baby sister.

"If you say so," Simon said, smirking. "He's not really my type." Simon turned to River. "You know what he did on the cargo ship?"

"Allegedly," River said, sarcastically. "I'm sure he's really nice once you get to know him."

This time Simon didn't take the bait. "He's dangerous."

"Me too," River said in a small voice. She pulled herself up onto the counter and hugged her knees.

"Yes well," Simon said, uncomfortable. "With you, it's a medical condition. Those can be treated and cured."

"I'm broken," River said in the same tiny voice. "You want your sister back in one piece, but they took her away-"

Simon crossed the room and wrapped his arms around River before she could finish that thought. "Hush now," he said in a soothing voice. "I love you just the way you are. I wouldn't trade you for anything."

River's breath came in ragged gasps as she got herself under control without crying. Having Simon there helped. As much as he missed Osiris, at times like these, all he could think about was his baby sister.

After a moment, River spoke. "He's waking up."

Simon checked his patient. He hadn't moved, but Simon had long learned not to disregard anything River said so directly.

"Mr...um..." Simon realized he never asked for his patient's name. On Osiris, there would have been a chart. "Mr. Pirate?"

"Yargh," Victor mumbled. He tried opening his eyes, but the light immediately tried to gouge them out with a rusty ice pick. It seemed safer to keep them closed.

"Can you speak?" Simon asked in a low, but clear voice.

"Yeah, just stop shouting," Victor whispered feebly.

"River, run fetch the Captain please," Simon said. She did. To his patient, Simon asked "Can you tell me your name?"

"Victor," the man on the table said. He tried opening his eyes. This time they stayed open.

"Do you know where you are?"

"Did you forget?"

"Your very funny," Simon reassured his patient in a mechanical voice. "I'm trying to establish your mental state. Can you tell me where you are?"

"Serenity," the man said. He looked around. "I'm in the infirmary, or else you need a better taste in home decor." Looking down at his blanket he asked "Did you steal my clothes? You're pretty, but I like women-"

"They were cleaned," Simon said, retrieving Victor's clothes from a drawer. He didn't think he like this man and held onto the hope he could be serious for a single second. "The Captain said you knew us?"

Victor sat up suddenly, almost knocking the bundle out of Simon's hands. "My dog? Where is he?"

"He's safe," Simon said, handing Victor his clothes. "My girlfriend's watching him."

"Girlfriend, right," Victor said. He clutched his head as another wave of pain came forth. Probably from sitting up too fast. "Just because I turned you down is no reason to get all defensive."

"The Captain said you know us?" Simon repeated trying to get Victor on track. Being on Serenity had made him thicker skinned than he'd ever been.

"Everyone knows you, you're famous," Victor said, still holding his head.

Simon had Victor lie back down and gave him a shot of dimrohl. He wasn't concerned for the hangover, but pulling the catheter out of a conscious patient was going to be unpleasant. Simon was almost relieved. Removing the catheter and IV gave him an excuse to not talk to Victor.

Simon had just finished when Mal's voice led him into the room. "I hear our patient's back among the living," he said. Mal looked around. "Where's Jayne?"

"I'm not sure," Simon said, confused. "I haven't seen him since we went to sleep last night. Why?"

Mal rolled his eyes. "Nothing." To Victor he said, "How you feeling?"

Victor stood, naked and proceeded to get dressed. Mal recognized it as an attempt to be off putting, but he'd chosen the wrong crowd. It was hard to tell who'd care less: the doctor, the soldier, or the killer witch watching from the door way.

"I feel like I lost a fight with a sledgehammer," Victor said. "Doctor Tam here has been taking good care of me, though. My father was a doctor you know. A plastic surgeon on Osiris."

"Small world," Simon said. Simon was fairly sure he'd never met a Dr. Prince. As a night-rotation trauma surgeon, their paths were unlikely to have crossed.

"I got a story that needs some holes filled in," Mal said. "Start where you think appropriate, but end with what happened to your fellow pirates."

Victor took a deep breath. "Yes, Captain,"he said. Victor sounded almost formal, as if he were giving a debriefing. As he spoke, he stood up straighter and spoke clearly, despite his obvious hangover. Mal made a mental note to ask whether Victor had been a soldier.

Victor told his story. "I heard about the stranded ship on Persephone. I keep a lot of legitimate and fake licenses to make myself more valuable to potential employees-"

Mal understood that to be a nice way of saying Victor was a professional mercenary.

"and when I heard about the ship, I called port control and registered myself as the 'first responder' and shipped out with those carrion eaters. It was a brilliant plan, too. Pretend we're there to help, give the nice people a ride to the nearest settlement, and keep everything worth keeping." Victor seemed proud of himself.

Mal had taken a morally dubious job or two in his day, so he kept quiet and told himself he was making no assumptions about Victor's character. Yes sir, he was making no assumptions about the murderous, thieving pirate who would leave poor people stranded and destitute just to make money. "So what went wrong?"

"I didn't have a chance to check my 'crew's' backgrounds. If I had, I would've known half of them had a propensity for rape and murder. Also, the other half had a propensity for letting them, then lying to their employers and fences about it so they could stay in business."

"So you took the high ground and chopped them to pieces and carved their sins into their flesh," Mal asked dryly.

Victor either didn't pick up on Mal's sarcasm, or didn't care. He simply nodded. "Who's the babe?" he asked, looking around Mal to the doorway, where half of River's head was in view.

"That's our witch," Mal said. "She can kill you with her mind."

Now that got an actual reaction out of Victor. He looked back and forth from Simon to Mal, trying to tell if he was joking. Neither of them gave anything away. When the silence became awkward, Victor spoke. "Um... cool. Hey, there!"he said, waving at River.

River, who had been mostly hidden by the door, disappeared.

Victor blinked, wondering why she didn't at least say "Hi". He lifted his arm and took a sniff of his own armpit. "I was going to ask if I offend, but it's pretty obvious," he explained to Mal and Simon. "I need a shower."

"In a minute," Mal said. He still wasn't sure if he liked this man. Something about him seemed... off. Particularly, the way he spoke as though everything were a joke. "How come you recognized me?"

Victor regarded Mal carefully, not sure how to explain. "I'm a bit under the weather here, so take everything I say with a grain of salt.

On the core planets, your face and the faces of your crew gets constantly plastered all over every news bulletin. There's a five million large reward for information that leads to your capture."

Even Mal's eyes went wide at that number.

"That seems off," Simon said. "For that much the Alliance should be asking only for professional private agents to bring in the target alive and unhurt." He didn't know much about the Alliance's bounty hunters, but his scenario seemed more likely than a five million reward.

"It's a dead or alive bounty," Mal supplied, "masked with polite and civilized words like 'bring the dangerous fugitive to justice'."

Victor snapped his fingers and pointed at Mal with his hand in the shape of a gun. "You are correct, good sir!" he declared in game show host voice. "But, wait! It gets better!"

"I'm all ears," Mal said, crossing his arms in disapproval at Victor's seeming lack of regard to the plight of another human being.

"You, Cobb, Frye, and the Companion," Victor said, ticking off each member on a finger. "Your entire lives' stories are public record. Twisted, of course to make you all seem like crazy terrorists. I couldn't find anything on the Tams at all, except for privately posted vids of a dark haired Jane Doe in combat boots and spandex shorts trashing a border planet bar and the patrons in one go."

Mal could feel his veins standing out on his forehead. He tried to unclench his fists, but couldn't. Victor's extremely casual attitude about the people he cared about being turned into rats in a maze was really starting to rub him the wrong way. To Victor's detriment, he kept speaking.

"As best I can tell, they're keeping quiet about the Tams on the off chance they can be recaptured. I think their main priority is eliminating the crew of Serenity."

There was a loud, cracking noise as Mal inserted the toe of his boot, forcibly, into a lower cabinet. The cracking noise in this case was due to the door being on the receiving end of Newton's second law.

After another heavy silence, Simon spoke. "You seem awfully confident in your assessments. Who are you?"

"I'm a highly trained, competent professional. I specialize in finding creative solutions to unusual problems for the most discerning of public and private clients," Victor said. His tone of voice made it clear he'd recited that expression several times until it was second nature.

Simon felt sad that he understood exactly what Victor was saying. "That makes no sense. If you're a mercenary who works for the Allied Governments and their major corporations, why are you telling us all this? Why not turn us in and get the reward yourself?"

Mal and Simon both looked at Victor, waiting for an answer. Victor grinned from ear to ear, looking momentarily like an overgrown boy who had a great secret to tell. "I take it you're both ready for some good news?"

Mal had decided Victor was entirely too cheerful for his line of work. It was as if Kaylee were a sword wielding psychopath with no regard for anyone else. "I'm a little leery about your definition of 'good news'."

"Well...you remember that war you lost?"

Victor sounded like he was going to finish a thought, but Mal had one of his own. The Captain expressed said thought by slamming his hand around Victor's throat, choking both sound and air off. Victor was impressed by Mal's speed and strength. It took Simon pulling on Mal and Victor wedging one knee up between himself and his attacker just to get Victor's neck free. Mal's face was twisted into a rage Victor knew too well. It was blood lust, mixed with complete certainty in one's actions.

I like this guy, Victor decided.

"Captain Reynolds, please calm down," Simon was saying, panicked.

Victor took the more direct route. He picked his other foot up off the ground and kicked out, letting himself fall flat on the floor. Exhausted as he was, his kick still had enough force to send Mal flying into the far wall. His head clicked against a cabinet, momentarily bringing him to his senses.

"What I was going to say," Victor began without bothering to move. He lay flat, staring up at the ceiling, "before I was so rudely interrupted... was that part two has started."

"What?" Mal demanded, rubbing the back of his head.

Victor sat up, looking at Mal. Nothing on his face said he had any concern for Mal's attempt to strangle him. "Revolution. Civil War. You started it." He grinned from ear to ear. It was the same face and the same expression, but this time Mal didn't see an overgrown man-child. This time Mal saw a hungry wolf looking at a fattened cow.

Mal froze as the full meaning of what the unusual mercenary said sank in.

"Get to that shower," Mal snapped. "Everyone's going to need to hear this." He stomped out of the room without another word.

Victor turned to Simon, not getting up. "You heard the man. Captain's orders," he said. "Get to steppin." He clapped his hands together twice. "Chop, chop!"

Simon looked down at his now former patient. "After you. I insist."