Title: Tough

Rating: PG. For now, but it could bump up. Will bump up.

Characters: the whole crew, plus the Pirate Children and Alistair Caramia (the latter are mine, the rest are Joss's)

Pairings: Canon pairings. I will openly admit that I heavily, heavily favor Mal and Inara and the Reynolds Family. (Trying hard to rectify that without negatively affecting the storyline.)

Summary: Yet another Pirate Children story. Set twenty-eight years post-BDM. A not-so-fluffy (but still slightly fluffy) look at the future. Serenity's adjusting to her grown children.

Author's Note: Thanks for the great feedback! I'm so nervous about this one. It's pretty strange to write about the little ones when they're not so little.

Part 2

“How you feelin’, Daddy?” Serra asks facetiously the next morning, as Mal slumps into his chair at the end of the breakfast table. The only occupants of the table are Serra and Lolly, who seem to be just wrapping up their morning meal. “How do ya think?” “Shiny,” Serra grins, balancing mug and breakfast plate in her uninjured hand as she stands. “Can I get ya some coffee?” “You need ta drink more alcohol.” “I’ll keep that in mind.” “We’ll get ya some coffee, Uncle Mal,” Lolly grins with all of her mother’s cheersomeness. Too many women on his boat. Too many happy, cheerful women. “’Morning, Captain!” And Washburns. Too many gorramn cheerful Washburns. “Watch it, Kacey. The captain overdid it a little last night,” Lolly grins as the young man takes a seat beside her. “Yeah, I noticed. Barely got Monty home. Hey, Uncle Mal, if I promise to speak real quietly, can I talk to you about something?” Serra plops, unceremoniously, a mug of coffee in front of Mal. Mal winces and then nods at Kacey. “Go ahead, lil’ Washburn.” “I was talking with Monty and his first mate last night. Blake was sober. Anyway, they want to know if I can sign on for another six months or so.” Serra and Lolly’s heads pop up to meet their cousin’s, all sorts of abandonment in their eyes. Serra quickly looks away, suppresses her surprise and hurt, but Lolly continues to look at him with injured puppy eyes. Kacey has signed on with Monty as a temporary pilot four times before, for a few months at a time. Lolly had likewise spent a few intermittent months on another cargo-liner out of Boros since her eighteenth birthday. Still, six months is a very long time to leave the two girls, especially since Abe doesn’t finish medacad for another year. Kacey sighs at the girls’ response, “This isn’t about abandoning you two.” “No, no,” Lolly says, blue eyes still reflecting hurt. “It’s about you going out joyriding for six months. Just ‘cause Monty lets you pull all sorts of stuff Mom won’t let you try on Serenity, ‘less you blow the buffer panels like you did comin’ down on Harvest.” “That was five years ago,” Kacey shoots back. “It’s about having three pilots and only two pilot seats, Lolly. And getting some sort of life away from our parents.” Mal’s headache is growing. He takes a deep breath. “Bi zui. Kacey’s a man, now. He decides to go where he wants and when, dong ma? You’re all free to walk off this boat whenever you feel like it.” Serra snorts, meeting his eyes out of the corner of hers. “’Slong as I know where you’re goin’, that is.” Serra clears Lolly’s breakfast plates, slamming them into the sink, and making her exit. “Gorramnit, Serra,” Mal groans. This day is not going well. “Serra, get back here and talk about this.” He sighs, downing the rest of his coffee. “Kacey, get me a date on when you’re leavin’.” “Yes, sir,” Kacey says quietly. Mal stands and goes off looking for his daughter. Kacey looks to Lolly. “I didn’t mean to start a fight…” “Not talking to you,” Lolly informs him, storming off in the direction of the engine room.

***

“If you’re pissed at me, fine, but keep it to yourself. We got a job to do,” Mal says, frustrated, leaning against the bulkhead while waiting for Serra to come out of her bunk. She rolls her eyes at him as she emerges from the room, pistol strapped to her hip, arm still in a sling, mumbling in Spanish under her breath. “Whoa, now. I speak two gorramn languages. You’re gonna insults me, do it in one ‘a’ those.” “How do you know I’m insulting you?” she asks facetiously, walking alongside him as they head to the cargo bay. “I been around it long enough to get the jist.” “Sir, can I talk to you?” Zoe grabs him on the catwalk before Serra can bite back with a sarcastic remark. Mal nods, a little thankful for the break. “Mei-Mei, prep the mule, dong ma?” “Of course, Captain.” She hops down the stairs without so much as a glance behind. “She’s gonna be the death of me, Zoe,” Mal sighs. “Possibly, sir.” “What do you need?” “Wash and I are gonna be off ship all afternoon.” “What for?” “Look at some land, sir.” Her face is expressionless, though Mal begins to gape, headache growing. “Dirt-kissin’, Zoe? What the hell for?” “Nothing definite yet. We’re all gettin’ old, sir, in case you hadn’t noticed. Not so needed around here anymore.” “Not needed? Wash is the best gorramn pilot I’ve ever seen.” “But only one of three on this boat. An’ the other two are more’n capable.” “And you? What about you? I still need you.” “Do you really, sir?” she asks, looking down to the mule, where Serra packs away a few extra guns with the help of a limping Jayne, laughing at something the aging merc says. Mal swallows, guiltily, playing the last three years worth of jobs in his head. “Zoe…” “It’s okay, Mal. We’re all tired, old. It’s gettin’ time to move on. I know the Teach is itchin’ to set down somewhere. She’s a smart girl, wastin’ away on students who’ve outgrown her.” “Girl,” Mal scoffs a little, laughing more at his own self than what Zoe’s saying. “She’ll be forty in a couple months.” “See what I mean, sir?” “Let’s go, old man! We’ve got a schedule to keep.” Mal gives a tight, fake smile. “Such a pleasant child. Be back by nightfall.” “So slow!” Serra yells up the stairs. “So fong luh.” “I’m driving,” she claims, climbing into the mule. “Like hell. I’d like to live through the day.” He bumps her over to the passenger seat.

***

He’s not sure how it happens. Maybe he is still in a distracted, terrible mood after his conversations with Zoe, with Kacey. Maybe he is still hung over. It isn’t the pick-up; that went fine, upfront coin in his pocket, mule loaded with illegal rations en route to Bernadette. And then it somehow falls apart. They fall into an argument about “chasing them all away” and, as he is wont to do with the women in his life, Mal sticks his foot in his mouth. “Don’t know what you’re grumblin’ about. You spent the whole time holed up on pretty Core-worlds or humpin’ your farm boy on Shadow.” “Pull over.” Her voice is deadly quiet, deadly serious. “What? No.” “Pull the guay over. Now.” It’s the tone of voice she’s learned from her mother, the one that after over twenty-five years has him conditioned to obey without thinking. He stops long enough for her, slinged arm and all, to hop over the side of the mule and onto the street. “Be back by sundown!” “Puñetero.” * “I’m serious! We will leave without you.” Mal watches her disappear into the crowd and curses, turns the mule towards Serenity. “Where’s Serra?” Inara asks as Mal grumpily pulls the mule into the cargo bay. “Yeah, you finally sell her off? We could use the extra coin,” Jayne grins, hauling a crate off of the back of the mule and stacking it in the smuggler’s hold. His leg is still recovering from his recent spill off the back of the mule when fleeing a job gone south. Simon says, due to his age, it will never return to full use. “She took a walk,” Mal grunts, climbing out of the mule and stretching out his neck. “Alone?” “She’s a big girl; it’s a small town. She’ll be back… I hope.” “You hope?” Inara asks skeptically. “What did you do?” “Why’s it gotta be me? She’s just as difficult.” “Hey, Uncle Mal,” Lolly bounces down from the engine room. “Where’s Mei?” Mal huffs and blows past his niece, leaving her to look questioningly to her aunt. “Hey, Sparky,” Jayne greets, a subtle undercurrent of gruff affection. “They’re fightin’ again. Worse’n you and the cap’n, ‘Nara.” “Only recently,” Lolly comments, hopping down the rest of the stairs to aid Jayne in the stowing while Inara removes the bag of coin from the front console of the mule. “An’ things were finally looking better after you and Mei got back, Aunt ‘Nara.” Always the optimist, like her mother. “That’s just ‘cause he’s gettin’ humped regular again.” “Oh God, Jayne. Can we please not talk about that?” Lolly asks, making a face. Jayne shrugs. “Where’s lil’ Cobb?” “I’m not talking to him,” Lolly says, a little petulantly. “Don’t mean you don’t know where he is.” “Try his room. Or the cockpit.” His room. When had it become just his room? When Abe went to medacad three years ago? Or later, when he’d been gone for awhile and Serra stopped looking heartbroken every time someone mentioned her brother? Funny, Lolly thinks, that the one of them who’s changed the most is the one most resistant to change. “You think she’ll be okay out there?” Lolly asks Inara. “You want me to go look for her?” Inara wants to say yes to the latter question but refrains, makes herself smile. “She’ll be fine,” she says, heading up to the shuttle. “She’s Serra.” Which means she’s a trouble magnet, Lolly keeps to herself, but otherwise fairly capable and often scary as hell. It’s one of her worst memories. It gives her nightmares at night, makes her shudder if she thinks on it during the day. Growing up on Serenity means growing up around guns; there is no denying that. There is also a fair amount of violence. Abe slit Adelai Niska’s throat when he was only fifteen. Kacey was allowed to carry a gun and help with jobs when he was sixteen, and his first kill came a year or two later. Lolly declines to carry a weapon but knows how to use one as well as several basic self-defense moves. Because of this, she doesn’t generally go on jobs. Serra’s been carrying a pistol on her hip for four years now, but shot a man in the leg seven years ago, at the age of twelve. A man who was attacking Lolly, the older girl, the one who at eighteen should’ve been doing the protecting. But the man never touched Lolly, so that isn’t what gives her nightmares. No, it’s that Serra shot the guy in the leg without batting a pretty little eyelash. Brought him down, then told Lolly to come on, they had to get back to the ship. Twelve. Just doesn’t seem right to Lolly. The shooting was well and good and an unfortunate but necessary part of their lives, and she didn’t kill the man. But Abe was in shambles after killing Niska, and Kacey had his own little break down after the first time one of his bullets hit a real person. Serra told everyone what happened, handed the gun (nicked off the assailant, the kid had the deft hands of a pickpocket) to Jayne, and went along with the day. Inara was horrified, and even Mal was a little disturbed by his baby girl’s reaction. Horrified and disturbed, yes, but Lolly is pretty sure neither was surprised. Lolly herself, while understandably upset by witnessing this, was not surprised that of all of them, Serra was the youngest to use a gun. Still, in keeping up with precedent, Serra wasn’t allowed to start carrying a sidearm until she was fifteen, which is when Abe started. There were fights, intense fights, between the captain and Inara about Serra’s first shot, and Lolly is sure that her predilection to pickpocket was brought up, as well. To this day, Mal denies teaching her how to steal people’s wallets without their noticing. But Lolly guesses that they came to some sort of agreement, because Serra started training intensely with Aunt Zoe around her thirteenth birthday, beyond the normal gun training and target practice each of them had engaged in before. So Serra remains unaffected, and Lolly is left with the nightmares. Lolly must admit that’s a trend.

***

Spanish translations: *Jackass, colloquial to Spain

TBC