This is very different for me, an Alternate Universe fic. Trying to suss out what would have happened if River had never gone to the Academy, never been experimented on, and had gone on about her business as usual. Or, at least, as usual as a near-Reader genius child prodigy can be.

Different Strokes Chapter 1

The peaceful, curving, lines of her brushstrokes mirrored her mood. Slow, and methodically, she completed the final sweep across the canvas, and sighed contentedly. Tomorrow she would begin the detail work. These were just the undertones that would make up the base of the painting. The final work was still not fully visualized in her mind. She liked to let it wander when creating her artwork. Her guess as to how it would end up was as good as anybody’s.

River Tam. Artist. Mathematician. Dancer. Genius. Little sister.

She went over the list in her head, smiling. She had done enough for today. At least, that was what everyone always told her. ‘River, you’re going to wear yourself out’, ‘River don’t you ever sleep?’, ‘River, you’re up early today… or didn’t you go to bed?’. The last one was her favorite, even though she heard it often enough.

The truth was, she didn’t really feel the need for much sleep. A few hours, every other day, was enough for her. She knew it shouldn’t be healthy, but she was in perfect physical shape. She always had been. Between her dancing and the occasional martial arts training she did, she always had a toned, muscular, albeit petite, physicality.

Tonight, however, was a night for sleep. She lay against her pillow, and tried not to let her mind wander, because if she did, she knew that it would take her the rest of the night, and probably tomorrow, to reign in her fast-track thoughts. She’d once heard a very good description of how her mind worked, told to her about a particularly brilliant chemist that worked for the Alliance.

“You see, most people have this process; where their mind goes from point A to point B to C to D, so on and so forth. Dr. Forsythe goes straight from point A to point D.” The woman, Forsythe’s assistant, was saying to her.

“I think you have that same quality, River. Your mind works in ways that we may never fully understand.” The woman chuckled for a moment. When River inquired as to what was funny, she simply said, “While we’re trying to figure you out from point A, you’ve already reached the end of the alphabet, and are looking for more.”

River smiled ruefully at the memory, recalling every detail with perfect precision. The room had smelled of rubbing alcohol. It had been raining outside, but she could hear it on the roof. That had been 6 years ago, when she was 12, and had been looking at different universities and institutes to further her studies. She had taken the most advanced chemistry and mathematical classes the Core could offer, and still felt bored. Each of her dissertations was more brilliant than the last, however, pushing physics to the limit of (and beyond) everyone else’s understanding, she had inadvertently alienated herself from the scientific community.

Besides, she liked the quiet of the rim. At least, that’s what she told herself so that she could sleep at night. Whenever she did eventually get to sleep. Truth be told… she did like it out here. The people were very rough ‘n tumble, and you could very well die any day of the week, but the people out here were as real as they come. They didn’t hide behind masks, nor smile through their teeth. Well, sometimes, but they were mostly just the middlemen and ‘businessfolk’ of these parts. They had to have an air of superiority, because if they didn’t, those below them would start thinking they shouldn't be below them.

At this point, River conceded to herself that she was probably not going to sleep tonight, so headed towards the kitchen to get something to eat. She was surprised to find her brother, Simon, sitting at the table, slowly eating a bowl of cereal. He, apparently, was not as surprised to see her up and about at this hour.

“Morning, mei-mei, or night. Whichever you prefer.” He said sleepily, but with a small smile.

“Time is relative to the frame it’s referenced in.” She said happily in response. To his waiting eyes, she remarked, “it’s neither, and both.”

“What’s keeping you up tonight? You usually sleep on Wednesdays.”

“Thinking about the past. The way we work. Things that happen.” She said, with a small frown on her face. “Things that could have been, but were never actualized.”

“You know you made the right decision. The things they were having you work on could have only one possible outcome.”

“I know. It just worries me that I was involved in such a large part. They generally have lots of people working on different parts of the problem, so that nobody knows all of what’s going on.” Thoughts of sleepless nights spent at a console came back to her, working on high-energy physics calculations and projections.

“You know why they had you work on so much of it,” Simon paused for a moment, “you were the only one who understood it!” He said, some energy returning to him, and he forced a small smile at his sister’s genius.

“That’s what I’m afraid of.” She said quietly in response.

Simon cocked his head slightly to the side. “You think they’ll come after you… because you knew what the result of the project was going to be?”

“It’s how they work. It’s how they’ve always worked. They’re meddlesome, and anybody who gets too close… knows too much…” She let the sentence trail off, knowing Simon would know what she meant.

“I’m going for a ride.” She said, with renewed happiness.

“Alright, be careful, mei-mei.” Simon said, with renewed sleepiness. River sprinted out of the kitchen, towards the stable.

Riding had been one of the greatest things she had ever taught herself. She could always count on Robart, her favorite palomino, for comfort, as they galloped through the fields and forest around the complex. She closed her eyes, and gave no instruction to Robart, save for away from the complex, deep into the night. She just let him run, for at least a half-hour. When she opened her eyes, she was not surprised that she couldn’t see the estate behind her, despite its immense size. This world, Utara, was not on the rim, per se, but it was no Core planet. Just a little beyond her, she could see where the grassland and wooded wilderness ended, and the beginnings of an inhospitable desert began. Utara had been terraformed, of course, but only several places over the entire planetscape had the kind of region as the compound had been built on. That was part of the reason she and Simon had chosen this world. It was not the type of place that attracted attention.

She contented herself to have Robart trot slowly back towards the compound, though at this pace, it could take hours. That was fine with her. She looked up into the sky, admiring the star formations, when something caught her eye. A void where there shouldn’t be. Darkness, where she knew Arkonis, a small formation of stars in the shape of a man, should be. She had only enough time to come to a conclusion she wished weren’t true, before a small dot of light appeared from within the dark patch. This too set her mind running, as she knew it could only be one thing. She began to breathe very, very quickly, as she quickly triangulated the trajectory of the dot of light, which was coming closer and closer.

“No...” she said, quietly.

________________________________________

Back inside the compound, Simon had ended up making himself breakfast, because it would be dawn soon anyhow, and he was unusually hungry.

The only precursor to the stealthed nuke striking the compound was a small whistling sound. _________________________________________

River’s lower lip quivered as she saw the small dot approach the compound, soundlessly. She knew there was no way anyone inside had any inkling of what was going to happen. The Alliance Cruiser in orbit was running silent and dark, so as not to attract any attention of its own. The use of a stealth nuke meant that she was the target, and that they wanted her taken care of swiftly and without anyone else’s knowledge.

She turned her head as the missile struck, but could see the blinding flash through her closed eyes. It was only a few moments before she felt the slight, unnatural, wind of the blast.

Her eyes, frozen in shock, stared at the remains of the place she had called home for over 4 months. Her mouth worked soundlessly, her mind a jumble of thoughts, mostly incoherent. One did shine through the rest, though. Her big brother, Simon, had been killed. There was no doubt in her mind. He could not have escaped the tactical, surgically precise, nuclear attack. The others who lived in the building came to mind a moment later. There had been at least 80 people there. All dead, because of her.

“Simon…” she said, helplessly. A feeling of overwhelming grief and loss, along with a burning hatred for the Alliance, stewed within her. Turning Robart around, she coerced him into a gallop, towards the nearest settlement. A settlement that had a problem with bandits, she knew. Still, she rode on.

What she didn’t know, however, was that the Town Elect (twenty men and women who made official decisions for the small town) had hired out, to take care of the thugs. A man, by the name of Reynolds, had answered the call of an old friend who happened to be on the Elect.