AN: Okay, so I have heard back from a few people and they seem to confirm what I was thinking...that splitting this fic up after I tie up the Serenity plot line would be better. So this means that this fic will be coming to an end shortly...I am not sure how many updates it will take me to finish out the story line, but the end is near people. That being said, I do plan to continue with the Chronicles and new movie plot-lines in this verse, so be on the watch for those! Thank you to all my wonderful readers, followers, and reviewers. Shout outs go out to the recent reviews from Guin, BooklvrAnnie, Irishbtrneyes, and Shenandoah76209. Now on with the show!
Chapter 48: What if this storm ends?
XXX
They have her in the storage room next to the common area. River is still asleep, and Mal is just finishing chaining her wrists. She lies on her side, breathing evenly. Mal stares at her a moment, then exits to the dinning room.
Everyone is waiting for him, except Wash who is piloting Serenity out of Beaumonde as fast as he can
"May I see her?" Simon asks.
"She's still napping just now. And I believe you've got some storytelling to do." Mal says sternly.
Wash enters before Simon can start though. "We're out of atmo. No one following as of yet."
"Good." Mal says before turning back to Simon. "What in hell happened back there?"
Wash interjects now by sticking his arm in the air. "Start with the part where Jayne gets knocked out by a ninety pound girl. 'Cause I don't think that's ever getting old."
"Flyboy you know she can fight, you wouldn't have done much better." Riddick says before Jayne gets any more riled up.
"Do we know if anyone was killed?" Zoe asks seriously.
"I counted at least 5. I know she meant to kill me 'fore the Doc put her to sleep, which how exactly does that work anyhow?" Mal asks Simon.
"Safeword...it was in her files. River and the other subjects were being embedded with behavioral conditioning. It listed a safeword, in case... something happened."
Kaylee looks confused now. "Not sure I get it.
"A phrase that's encoded in her brain, that makes her fall asleep. If I speak the words, "Eta -"
Jayne jumps up from the chair he is sitting in now. "Well don't say it!"
Riddick gives him a look like River gives him when he is being an ass. "It only works on her, Jayne."
Jayne looks a little embarrassed now. "Oh. Well, now I know that."
Mal looks a might agitated.
"May I see her?" Simon asks again, and Mal softens and lets him pass.
"She goes woolly again, we're gonna have to put a bullet to her." Jayne says. Everyone shoots him a look like he is an ass, but it's what they were all thinking.
"Jayne..." Riddick says in warning.
"I didn't mean in the head! Just in the leg or something to slow her down."
"Can I make a suggestion that doesn't involve violence, or is this the wrong crowd?" Wash says trying to calm people down.
"Honey..." Zoe warns.
Book has been quiet up until now, but now he steps in to say his peace. "Fanty and Mingo might be coming hard down on us, or the law... or maybe nobody could be bothered about a little social brawl. We need to get our bearings. I think we need to talk to Mr. Universe."
Mal looks at him a moment before nodding his head to agree. "See, sage advice. Knew we kept you around for something."
"And here I thought it was my cooking." Book says as everyone gets up and walks towards the bridge. Riddick stays behind though and moves to the storage room where River is being kept.
XXX
...Reality Shifts...
She's standing in a pool of blood...an axe and a sword in her hands. She is covered in it...every inch of her...
...What if this storm ends?
And I don't see you
As you are now
Ever again...
The blast doors in front of her open now...and she sees them...but her eyes focus on his...and in that moment she see's herself through his eyes...mercurial colors swim and highlight her like a the vengeful goddess he sees her as...
The perfect halo
Of gold hair and lightning
Sets you off against
The planet's last dance
She hears the crash behind her feels the air being sucked out through the opening...she doesn't need to turn around to know how many people there are behind her...and what they are capable doing.
Just for a minute
The silver forked sky
Lit you up like a star
That I will follow
She's tense...she's running the numbers...so many variables, very few outcomes... they wait for their orders, but she know's they won't come...she felt him slip away...so many variables, very few outcomes...and as these seconds tick by, she knows she is losing more and more...
Now it's found us
Like I have found you
I don't want to run
Just overwhelm me
She takes a breath now and steadies herself...she's made her choice...she know's what she has to do...
What if this storm ends?
And leaves us nothing
Except a memory
A distant echo
She feels the tears well in her eyes...as she raises the axe in her hand and prepares to throw it...
I want pinned down
I want unsettled
Rattle cage after cage
Until my blood boils
"I'm sorry." She says barely above as whisper as she raises the axe and throws it at the panel that controls the blast doors. There is a hiss and a spark as they slam shut again.
I want to see you
As you are now
Every single day
That I am living
She knows he hears her as the doors slide shut...she feels it in him...feels his anger... his sorrow...she hopes he can forgive her...
Painted in flames
All peeling thunder
Be the lightning in me
That strikes relentless
...Reality Shifts Again...
XXX
Riddick's POV
I stand at the door and watch as the Doc checks on his sister.
"She okay Doc?" I ask as he finishes up.
"I think so." He says as he stands up and moves towards me.
"I'm not sure what that did to her though...there wasn't much in her files about the safeword. Just that there was one."
My anger spikes now. I want to gut them, each and every last person that did this to her.
"Those fucker's don't deserve to live." I growl as I restrain myself from punching the wall.
"I feel the same way."
XXX
...On Serenity's Bridge...
It had taken very little time for Mr. Universe to find the security feeds after Book had contacted him. He streams the video to Serenity while watching them as well.
"Oh, this is good. This is..." He giggles like a little girl now. "She's beating up all the burly men and I'm having a catharsis, it's happening right now, you guys always bring me the very best violence. You think you're in a hot place?"
"That's what we are hoping to find out. Is there any follow up, anything unusual..."
"Derrial you of all people would know this wouldn't go through normal channels..."
"What about the other ones?"
"No sir, none that I see. And no lawforce flags, either - I hadda go into the security feed direct..."
"You can do that?" Mal says with minor surprise in his voice.
"Security feeds are a traipse to access... and I wasn't the first one in, this has prints on it ... oh! Look at her go! Everyone is getting bruises and contusions. Contoooosions."
Zoe pipes in now. "So somebody else has been fed this. That doesn't like me too well."
"Zoe, you sultry minx, stop falling in love with me. You're just gonna embarrass yourself. I have a commitment to my Lovebot."
"Your what?!" Jayne exclaims.
"My Lovebot Lenore, which you all were so kind enough to deliver for me the last time you were here... it was a very beautiful ceremony, Lenore wrote her own vows, I cried like a baby, a hungry, angry baby."
Everyone kinda of shifts uneasily, not complete sure what to say. Book just chuckles at his old friend.
Mr. Universe continues to watch the security feeds. "And she falls asleep. Which, she would be sleepy."
"Can you go back? See if anybody spoke with her 'fore she acted up, made any kind of contact with her..."
Mr Universe works the screen. The image rewinds and stops on River coming up to it, looking at it. She whispers the word, "Miranda", and starts to move away.
"Miranda...? Go back further." Mal says as he watches the footage M. Universe is streaming to them.
Mr. Universe looks for a minute. "No.."He says as he pulls another screen close, starts working that one. Matching time-codes, he pulls up the commercial.
"Um... please?" Mal says sheepishly.
Mr Universe streams a third screen now showing the commercial as well - and it starts breaking down, bursts of code showing through.
"Friends and potential lovers, I have good news and I have the other kind. Good is you're very smart. Someone is talking to her."
"The oaty bar!?" Wash asks skeptical.
Realization dawns on Mal now. "Subliminal. It's a subliminal message broadwaved to trigger her."
Mr. Universe is nodding at Mal. "I been seeing this code pop up all over, last few weeks. And I cannot crack it. It's Alliance and it's high military, so here then is the bad. Someone has gone to enormous trouble to find your little friend. And found her they have."
Mal, Zoe and Wash look at each other, very uneasy now.
XXX
River's POV
The girl is impassive, she is here but not present...everything feels foreign and her brain swims with the images they put there...she keeps trying to decipher the mass of images... she wants to see why...
She feels their presence as she wakes up and she props herself up against the wall...they are talking in hushed voices outside the door...she feels Simon look in now...and he opens the door and walks in to check on her...Riddick is right behind him.
"They're afraid of her." She says as she looks down to her manacled hands.
"I'm sorry..." Simon says as he dabs a damp cloth on her face to wipe away some of the dried blood.
"They should be. What I will show them... Oh God..." She starts tearing up, breathing faster... Simon runs his hands through her hair.
"It's okay, it's okay..."
"Show me off like a dog, old men covered in blood, it never touched them but they're drowning in it... so much loss... I don't know what I'm saying. I never know what I'm saying..."
"You said something. When you were triggered, do you remember River? The Captain saw you say something on the feed..." Riddick prompts.
"Miranda." She whispers.
"Miranda." Simon repeats.
She feels the laugh bubble up inside of her now...its a bitter laugh and it leaves a bitter taste in her mouth. "Ask her. She'll show you all."
"Show us what? Who is Miranda?" Riddick asks.
But she doesn't say anything...she doesn't know...and she can't figure out how to make her mind explain.
"Are we... talking to Miranda now?" Simon asks with concern.
She shoots him a look.
"No. Right. But I think somehow when they triggered you it brought this up, this memory..."
The scenes flash before her eyes...their burning up her brain now...she grabs at Simon like he's a life line to keeping her grounded.
"It isn't mine. The memory. I didn't bring it and I shouldn't have to carry it, it isn't mine." And she cannot help but sob uncontrollably.
The sobs turn to laughs soon as she tilts her head back..."Put a bullet to me. Bullet in the brain pan, squish."
Now she feels strong arms shake her. "Don't say that. Not ever. We'll get through this." Riddick says.
She reaches out and touches his face, affectionately...his mind is trying to find a song to sing her...his heart trying to tell her something...but his mind won't let the man say the words yet...
"Things are going to get much much worse."
"River. What will Miranda show us."
She thinks...she closes her eyes and she sees the flashes...their faces...hears their screams in her ears...
"Death."
"Whose death?"
And she starts laughing. Quietly at first, then louder, then almost uncontrollably, and she cannot control the scream of an answer that escape.
"EVERYBODY'S!"
XXX
Riddick's POV
This is why I don't care about people...people disappoint you...they let you down...
Seeing River like this, completely broken open, her mind in pieces...this is why I never cared about anyone...
I leave the room after her brother gives her a shot to knock her out. He follows me out a minute later.
"We have to keep her like that." I say with authority.
"I know..." he says as his head slumps. "She's very likely to hurt herself if we don't."
"Suicide watch then?"
"I'm afraid so. I'll let the others know." The Doc says as he walks off towards the bridge.
I look at the closed door and throw one of my shivs at it in frustration. This is why I never cared before...
XXX
...Later that Evening...
They were all taking turns keeping an eye on River. Simon and Riddick had taken the first watch, and Kaylee and Zoe the next. Now it was Book and Mal's turn.
Both men sit ideally in the common area. Book reading his bible and Mal just listening to the whir of Serenity's engines.
"Lord, I am walking your way, Let me in, for my feet are sore, my clothes are ragged. Look in my eyes, Lord, and my sins, will play out on them as on a screen. Read them all. Forgive what you can, and send me on my path. I will walk on, until you bid me rest."
Mal sits up a little now. "Hope that ain't for me, Shepherd."
"It's prayer for the dead." Book says as he closes his bible.
Mal chuckles. "Then I really hope it ain't for me."
There is sadness in his voice when Book speaks next. "It's for the men River killed in that bar."
"Weren't River that did it, you know that. Somebody decided her brain was just another piece of property to take, fenced it right up." Mal says with a hint of anger in his voice.
Book turns to him. "You got a plan?"
"Hiding ain't a plan?"
"It'll do you for a spell..."
"...but they'll be coming. Alliance is after this girl with a powerful will. I look to hear the tromp of their boots any moment." Mal states.
"You won't." Book simply replies.
Mal gives him a look as if to say to go on and he obliges. "This isn't a palms-up military run, Mal. No reports broadwaved, no new warrants... much as they want her, they want her hid. That means Closed File. Means an Operative, which is trouble you've not known."
Mal runs his hands through his hair. "I coulda left her there." He gets up and walks over to the door to the storage room and peaks in the glass window.
"I had an out... hell, I had every reason in the 'verse to leave her lay and haul anchor."
"Not your way, Mal."
"I have a way?" and he thinks for a moment as he walks back to the table. "Is that better than a plan?"
"You can play the thug all you want, but there's more to you than you're ever like to 'fess...you care for the girl like she is your own. It's made even more interesting by the fact that you care for her mother..."
Mal gives him a look now as if to ask where he is going.
"Whether you want to admit it or not Mal, you protected her from the moment she popped out of that box...it's why we all find it so amusing you get so riled up when she calls you Captain Daddy..."
The Shepherds words begin to sink in now and Mal looks even more sad than he did before.
"Only one thing is gonna walk you through this, Mal. Belief."
"Sermons make me sleepy, Shepherd. I ain't looking for help from on high. That's a long wait for a train don't come."
"When I talk about belief, why do you always assume I'm talking about God?"
Mal has no response for him now.
"They'll come at you sideways. It's how they think: sideways. It's how they move. Sidle up and smile, hit you where you're weak...Sorta man they're like to send believes hard. Kills and never asks why."
Mal regards the man in front of him like he is meeting him for the first time now. "It's of interest to me how much you seem to know about that world."
"I wasn't born a Shepherd, Mal."
"Have to tell me about that some time."
Book gives him a little wry smile now. "No I don't...but you never know."
XXX
...House Madrassa...
Inara is sitting tensely at the table. She is trying not to show how much the man across from her unnerves her.
"More tea?" She asks as politely as possible.
"Yes, thank you Ms. Serra." He says as he extends his cup for her to pour into.
He watches her as she refills his cup.
"There is a great deal of you in her." He says as she finishes.
Inara holds her breath, inwardly asking how? How could he possible know?
As if hearing her inner thoughts he answers. "She has your eyes, and your grace."
Inara's eyes narrow at him now. She no longer feels the need to keep up the charade. "Tell me, how do you sleep at night? Knowing your hunting an innocent girl."
"Oh but that's where you are wrong, your little girl is far from innocent."
"She was tortured."
"Torture is a strong word."
"Brave men do not gather by thousands to torture and murder a single individual, so gagged and bound she cannot make even feeble resistance or defense."
"But she did, she was quite exquisite as she slaughtered all of the scientists and people in her way. I have seen the footage, perhaps you would care to see it too?"
"Your a monster."
"That may be...if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you."
XXX
...A few hours later...
Mal is startled awake. He jerks up from his bunk at the noise. "Whuh huh nuhwhat?"
"Mal! You up? Got a wave. I'm a bounce it down to you." Wash says over the comm.
Mal pops up now, he urns to the screen as the white noise becomes:
"Inara."
"Mal. I uh, is this a bad time?" She asks as she sees he doesn't have a shirt on.
"Good as any."
"Please tell me you're wearing pants." She replies as she looks him up and down, a small blush creeping into her cheeks.
Mal grins slightly now. "Naked as the day I come cryin'. How's your world?"
"Cold. It's autumn here."
The second she doesn't react, he knows something is up. He sees her look off the scream a little and it confirms what he thought.
"Still at the Training House?"
"Right where you left me." She says quickly. Mal can tell she is nervous.
"I remember it as nice enough...picturesque."
"It is that. What about you?"
"Still flying. So what occasi the wave?"
"I... I guess we have something of a problem here. With the locals, I thought maybe..."
Mal cuts in before she can finish. "You could use a gun hand?"
"I'm hoping not. But if you were close at all, you - the crew - could take your ease here a while... and there'd be payment..."
"Payment is never not a factor. I could sound out the crew... This pot like to boil over soon?"
"Soon. Not right away." Inara smiles blandly, nods. Again she glances off screen for the briefest of moments.
"Well, it's kind of late where I'm at. I'll send a wave as soon as I can."
"Thank you." She disappears. Mal thinks a moment before grabbing a shirt and heading upstairs.
XXX
...Serenity's Bridge a few moments later...
Mal comes up in, buttoning his shirt.
"So, trap?" Zoe asks as she sees Mal walk in.
"Trap." Mal responds as he does up the last button.
"We goin' in?" Jayne asks.
"It ain't but a few hours out..."
Wash cuts in now. "Yeah, but, remember the part where it's a trap?"
"If that's the case, then Inara's already caught in it. She wouldn't set us up willing. Might be we got a shot at seeing who's turning these wheels. We go in."
XXX
...The next day...
Serenity moves gracefully over the mountains near House Madrassa. Since Inara still had their only shuttle, they were going to have to drop in close enough that walking wouldn't be too difficult.
Wash, Zoe, and Mal are in the bridge, looking out across the horizon for any hint of Alliance.
"We're about five miles from the Training house. And nobody on radar... if the Alliance is about, they're laying low." Wash says.
"They're about. Find us a home. I'll walk it. Zoe, ship is yours." Mal says as he turns to walk out of the bridge. He turns back towards Zoe after a few steps.
"Remember: if anything happens to me, or you don't hear from me within the hour... you take this ship and you come and rescue me."
Zoe leans back against Wash's seat a little, a hint of amusement in her voice. "What? And risk my ship?"
Mal turns and continues out now. "I mean it. It's cold out there. I don't wanna get left."
XXX
AN: DUN DUN DUN! Poor River, but unfortunately like she said it's going to get a whole lot worse. As always reviews, good or bad, always appreciated.