Predictably, Jayne was the first to find his voice.

“How the hell did you do that?”

Jes smiled tiredly.

“Quite simple, actually. See, all I did was displace the molecules around…you really have no idea what I’m all on about, do you?”

The deepened creases in Jayne’s brow was all the answer needed.

Mal finally spoke up.

“Fun as it is to watch Jayne try to get the hamster running in the wheel again, what sort of secret government power allows you to make shotglasses float three inches off a table?”

Another tired smile, almost as if Jes would rather just send everyone away and go lay down for several hours. She picked up a small steripack holding a scalpel and tore it open.

“The same one that lets me do this.”

She drew the blade across her thumb until blood welled up. She closed her other hand around the thumb for a few seconds, staring off into space. The crew could have sworn they saw a faint glow from behind her hand. When she took her hand away and showed the crew her thumb, there was no indication that it had ever been cut.

Jayne opened his mouth to ask a question again, but Jes cut him off.

“Magic, OK? I did it with magic. Are you always this quick on the uptake?”

Wash responded, “Believe it or not, this is one of his better days.”

Simon cleared his throat to try and get the conversation back on track.

“OK, well, now that we’ve seen a demonstration of miraculous healing explained by…well, I’m not quite sure…what does this have to do with River?”

Jes poured herself another shot and tossed it back in one go.

“Forgive me, it’s been a long day and I am not used to having to give command performances. About 20 years ago, the Alliance decided to start an experimental…well, breeding program isn’t quite the right word. Educational program, let’s call it. One of their researchers had discovered a rare genetic mutation that could result in abilities like mine or the little bird’s, and they figured if they could find these mutants early enough and train them properly, they could be used undercover to keep tabs on the growing Independent movement.”

“Pretty big undertaking to find just a handful of folk,” Zoe observed.

“Not so much. Remember those mandatory physicals we all had to do at age 12 by Alliance law? Including blood samples? Guess what gone done with them?”

Simon stared. “A genetic screening program? How did they miss River, then?”

“Remember what I said about broken eggs? Well, the first one was thinking that nobody would manifest the mutation until their teen years, due to hormonal changes. Which was true, in a sense. Except those of us that were the first ‘students’ of this educational program were too far along developmentally to properly integrate the mutation. Your little bird, you see, was actually the first successful integration precisely because she manifested before puberty.”

Mal still looked skeptical.

“You seem to have come through OK.”

“If you can call the pounding headache I am likely to have at about 3 am to be OK.”

Simon interrupted again. “What was the second broken egg?”

“Assuming the mutation would only manifest in one form. Like my telekinesis combined with my healing abilities.”

For the third time, Jayne opened his mouth.

“So besides being a reader, she could do other crazy stuff?”

“Right in one, Big Boy. She might even be able to render you impotent just by squinting at you.”

At Jayne’s alarmed look and Kaylee’s stifled grin, Jes shook her head.

“Is he always that easy a mark?”