AN: Thank you to Moon FireStar, hideher, and for the great reviews. And now on with the show =)
Chapter 29
XXX
After a few more chastising words from the women of Serenity Mal leaves the cargo bay and the rest of the crew to go look for his 'bride.'
"Hello? Woman... person?" He says as he climbs upstairs. There he sees the woman sitting in a corridor quietly crying.
"You all right?" He asks.
She turns big saucer eyes up to him now. "I thought last night during the ceremony that you were pleased."
He scratches the back of his head now, not exactly sure how to handle this. "Well, yeah, last night I was. Had some mulled wine, pretty girl gave me a hat made out of a tree. Nobody said I was signing up to have and to hold."
"Are you gonna kill me?" She asks plaintively.
"What? What kind of crappy planet is that?" He scoffs. "Kill you."
"In the maiden's home I heard talk of men who weren't pleased with their brides –"
"Well I ain't them! And don't you ever stand for that sort of thing. Someone ever tries to kill you, you try to kill 'em right back!" He says as he moves to sit next to her. "Look, wife or no, you are no one's property to be tossed aside. You got the right same as anyone to live and try to kill people. I mean, you know... people that are... That's a dumb planet."
"What will you do with me?"
"Not rightly sure. We're bound for Beaumonde. Decent kind of planet. Might be able set you up some kind of work there."
"I'll not be anyone's doxy." She says with mild indignation.
"I don't mean whoring. I mean the factories and the like. Some ranches, if you're more for the outdoors. Three days before we get there. We'll figure something."
She looks at him longingly now. "I'd be a good wife.
"Yeah, well, I'd be a terrible husband. You got three whole days to figure that out."
"Three days... we'll be together?" She asks hopefully.
"We'll be together on the ship, but not in any…"
"That'll be fine. I'll do for you …or not…as you choose."
"Well. Shiny… Hungry? Kitchen's just through there."
"I'll cook you something." She says as she moves quickly toward the kitchen area.
Mal trails after her. "Well, no, I meant for you."
"I'm a fine cook. Everyone says."
"That's-that's great. What... Hold it. Hold...I ain't never even…"
"My name is Saffron." She says as she exits the corridor.
Just as she is out of earshot, Book steps into the corridor, holding his bible.
"Divorce is very rare and requires dispensation from her pastor. I can send him a wave, see what I can do." Book says flatly.
"I appreciate that…She's a nice girl." Mal says nervously.
"Seems very anxious to please you."
Mal is sensing a lecture now and becoming hesitant to continue the conversation. "Well, that's their way, I guess."
"I suppose so…I'll tell you the same thing I told Riddick shortly after I met him though…" Book begins.
"Oh what's that?" Mal asks.
"If you take sexual advantage of her, you're going to burn in a very special level of hell. A level they reserve for child molesters and people who talk at the theater."
"What…I am not... preacher, you got a smutty mind!" Mal says with mild shock.
"Perhaps I spoke out of turn."
"You may perhaps I'm thinking!"
"I apologize."
Mal looks at him a little more curiously now. "Did you really tell that to Riddick?"
"I thought it needed to be said."
"Huh. Would have figured you talk to River instead of him."
"Oh I tried that first…but she has a way of…convincing people she knows what she is doing." He says with a chuckle.
Mal snorts. "You got that right."
"I'll just go make up a spare room in the passenger dorms then." Book says as he walks away and around the corner. But a moment later he pokes his head back around. "The special hell."
XXX
River's POV
"Uhh…" she says as she moves her hands to clutch her head.
"Bout time you woke up Sleepin' Beauty." She hears Orpheus say from somewhere in the room.
"What happened?" She says as she moves the pillow over her face. It is quickly lifted off of her face though, and her vision is blinded by the overhead lights…stupid jerk.
"You want the long or the short of it?" He asks as he sits next to her on the bed.
"Short please." She says as she rolls over.
"You tried to outdrink Jayne, failed, asked Inara if she loved the Captain, who incidentally got himself hitched last night, and once I got you back here you proceed to pass out."
She rolls over and looks up at him now. "Did she hear you correctly that the Captain got married?"
"Yup."
XXX
…Inara's shuttle…
Inara sits in front of her console, programming appointments. Beaumonde. City of New Dunsmuir. Arrival October 24th. Departure…However she is interrupted by the Captain.
"Can I come in?" He asks from the doorway.
She doesn't bother to turn around to answer. "No."
"See? That's why I usually don't ask." He says as he enters the shuttle.
She sighs and turns around now. "What do you want?"
He sits down on one of her floor cushions now. "Oh, I just... needed a place to hide."
"So I take it the honeymoon's over?"
"Nara, don't be like that…you know I had no clue what was going on. How the hell was I supposed to know that her given me some tree thing and some wine was a marriage ceremony?"
"Your right, it's just…" But she stops short.
He moves closer to her now. "Just what Nara?" He asks.
"I…I don't know."
"Well let me know when you do." He says as walks outside, leaving her be.
XXX
As Mal walks back towards the bridge he is confronted by Jayne…who incidentally is carrying a rather large gun.
"There's times I think you don't take me seriously. I think that ought to change." Jayne says as he approaches the Captain.
"Do you think it's likely to when you come at me with that in your hands?"
But Jayne isn't backing down. "You got something you don't deserve."
"And it's brought me a galaxy of fun, I'm here to tell ya."
Jayne moves forward now and tries to hand the gun to Mal, who just looks at Jayne in confusion. "Six men came to kill me one time. The best of 'em carried this. It's a Callahan full-bore autolock. Customized trigger, double-cartridge thorough gauge…It is my very favorite gun."
Realization hits Mal square in the face now. "What in holy hell? You offering me a trade?"
"A trade? Hell, it's theft. It's the best damn gun made by man. It has extreme sentimental value. It's miles more worthy than what you got."
"What I got? She has a name!" Mal yells.
"So does this. I call it Vera."
"Well my days of not taking you seriously are certainly coming to a middle, that's for damn sure."
Jayne is getting sullen now. "Well, damnit Mal, I'd treat her okay."
"She's not to be bought, nor bartered, or borrowed, or lent. She's a human woman doesn't know a damn thing about the world and needs our protection." Mal says sternly.
"Well I'll protect her!"
"Go play with your rain stick!" Mal says as he walks away from his hired gun.
XXX
…Mal's bunk…
She slips in unnoticed by anyone and immediately pulls a small portable cortex from the ruffles of her skirt. She dials in the correct code and waits for it to connect.
"You got a ship yet?" The man asks her.
"Yes. A Firefly." Saffron replies.
"A Firefly? Those things are a wreck."
"No, this is good."
"It's parts. A lot of cheap parts we'll never unload."
"She'll work dammit!" Saffron says not bothering to hide her irritation. "Look I'm running things here, I'm the one with the access codes and what not, so you will do as I say dong ma?"
"Yeah, yeah…just wave us when you're about to clear off and we'll swoop in." The man says as he disconnects the feed.
She closes the cortex back up and slips it back into her skirt. She then takes out a small tube of lipstick and applies it to her lips.
"They'll never know what hit them." She says with an evil smile.
XXX
River's POV
"…they'll never know what hit them…"
"Daxiang baozhashi de laduzi!" She says as she sits up with a start and scrambles out of bed with more than a little haste.
Riddick just looks on at her a little confused. "Riv…what's going on?"
"Black widow…web of lies…" She says as she throws on a shirt and pants and scrambles up the ladder. She can hear Orpheus's footsteps behind hear as she takes off in a run towards the bridge.
She can hear Wash and Zoe in the middle of a heated discussion.
"Every planet has its own weird customs. About a year before we met, I spent six weeks on a moon where the principal form of recreation was juggling geese. My hand of god…Baby geese. Goslings. They were juggled!"
"Captain shouldn't be babysitting a damned groupie, and he knows it."
"IT'S A TRAP!" She yells when she finally reaches them.
They both turn and look at her now with identical looks of worry on their faces.
XXX
Just as River and Riddick run into the bridge, Mal enters his room from the walkway above. How he missed those two running by is beyond anyone's comprehension, though. He idly begins unbuttoning his shirt as he walks farther into the room. He looks up and is startled to find Saffron in his bed…very naked.
"Hey! You're, uh... uh... well, there you are."
"I've made the bed warm for you." She says.
Mal stands frozen. "It looks, uh, warm."
"And I've made myself ready for you."
"Let's ride right past the part where you explain exactly what that means. Didn't you see you got a room of your own?"
"And I'm to sleep there?" She says with confusion.
"That's the notion. Assuming you're... yeah. Sleepy."
"But we've been wed. Aren't we to become one flesh?"
"Well, no, uh... We're still two fleshes here, and I think that your flesh ought to sleep somewhere else."
XXX
River's POV
"Are you sure?" Zoe asks her after she had explained the errant black widow's thoughts that floated through her mind.
"Positive."
"Do you have a plan then rolling around that brain of yours?" Riddick asks her.
"She is working on it…" She says as she runs to the controls and begins typing in commands to cut the main and auxiliary power to the Serenity's shuttles.
"What did you just do?" Wash asks as he watches the indicator lights for the shuttles come on.
She turns to him with a sly grin on her face. "She set her own trap."
Riddick smiles now, understanding perfectly what she intends to do. "Mind if I take a walk?"
"Not at all."
XXX
"I'm sorry. When we talked I'd hoped, but I don't…" She moves to stand but Mal stops her before any other fleshy bits can be exposed.
"Whoa, hey! Flesh... Listen, Saffron... it ain't a question of pleasing me. It's more a question of what's, um, of what's morally right."
"I do know my bible, sir… On the night of their betrothal the wife shall open to the man as the furrow to the plow. He shall work in her again and again, til she bring him to his full. And rest him then upon the sweat of her breast."
XXX
Riddick's POV
I don't bother to knock as I enter Inara's shuttle. She looks up from her cortex a little surprised.
"Riddick, what's wrong?"
"Captain's new bride is up to something…need your acting skills for a minute or two."
"What?"
"Just do as I say and we'll explain later." I say as I grab her arm and yank her out the door.
XXX
Now he more than just frozen, Mal is completely dumbstruck. "Whoa. Good bible."
"I'm not skilled, sir. Nor a pleasure to look upon…"
"Saffron, you're pleasing." He says as he sits down. "You're... yep, you're all kinds of pleasing. But you and me, we ain't married. Just 'cause you got handed to me by some hun dan don't make you beholden to me. I keep trying to explain…" But he doesn't get a chance to finish as Saffron clocks him over the head with metal bar she had hidden in the pillows.
"Son of a..." Mal says as he falls backward onto the floor unconscious.
XXX
Saffron is running across the catwalk toward a shuttle door. As she reaches for the door, Inara opens it from the inside and steps out, startling Saffron.
"Oh! Are you lost?" Inara asks puzzled.
Saffron slips back into her act. "I'm sorry. I thought the other shuttle was yours."
"It is. I was on the cortex and my screen shorted. This one's out too."
"Looking for customers?" Saffron asks as innocently as she can.
Inara's eyes narrow ever so slightly. "What were you looking for?"
"I don't mean to be rude. A companion's life is so glamorous and strange. I wish I had the skill for such a trade."
"Like to please your new husband?"
Saffron merely dismisses Inara's comment with the wave of her hand. "Oh he'll have none of me. For true I'm somewhat relieved. If I'm to learn of love, I'd like it to be at the hands of someone gentle. Someone who could feel what I feel."
"But Mal said... you-you don't approve of my work."
"Sure'n he said that to keep you from me. I was too curious about you. Ever since I saw you..."
Inara looks at her almost longingly now, playing her part perfectly. "Come to my shuttle."
"You would... you would lie with me?"
XXX
River's POV
"Now Wash." The girl says as she watches the pilot initiate the alarms.
XXX
Overhead, an alarm starts sounding, breaking the tension.
"I guess we've lied enough." Inara says dropping her act.
Saffron does the same. "You're good."
"You're amazing. Who are you?"
"Malcolm Reynold's widow." Saffron says with a sneer.
Inara, slightly stunned, blocks a punch from Saffron. Saffron pushes Inara down violently and runs for the shuttle, shutting the door behind her, strapping in, however she fails to notice the figure lurking in the shadows of the shuttle.
"Where do you think you're going?" Riddick says as he steps out of the shadows and surprises Saffron.
XXX
Inara immediately runs to Mal's room, not bothering to check on what the alarm means. Her only concern at that moment is Mal. She climbs down the ladder into his bunk and sees him lying on the floor.
She runs over to him and immediately starts screaming his name. "Mal! Mal-Mal! Mal moans incoherently.
"Oh thank Buddha." She says as she kisses him in relief.
That proceeds to wake Mal out of his stupor and he lifts a hand to the side of her face.
"Hey now? What did I do to deserve that?" He says as she pulls away, a smile plastered on his face.
Inara just chuckles and kisses him again.
XXX
…Elsewhere in the verse…
"Sir, the files you request are here." A young ensign says as he sets the files in question on the desk.
"Thank you." The Operative says without turning around to face the man.
The man quietly excuses himself from the room and closes the door behind him. It is only then that the Operative turns around and picks up the files.
"Simon Gabriel Tam…" He begins reading.
XXX
AN: Okay, so I know this is not what most of you are expecting out of Our Mrs. Reynolds, and I know it's kinda short…but don't worry…we aren't done with Saffron yet. A rabid plot bunny gave me a great idea for connecting Our Mrs. Reynolds and Trash, so Saffron is going to be sticking around a little while longer. And before you all jump on me for not using the goodnight kiss thing…I thought this ending went better with the expedited romance between Mal and Inara. Anyways…till next time ;)