(please forgive seemingly incurable paragraph-spacing errors)

Jayne could just see the clock on the front wall of the office, so it struck him a bit odd when the deputies brought him a steaming plate of fried chicken and fixings at a quarter to eleven in the morning.  The smell was divine, the ambrosial combination of spices, meat, and the sacred art of frying.  There was no shame to be had by the biscuits or greens either.  It was all Jayne could do to avoid drooling down his chin, transported for the briefest moments away from his place queued up for final judgement.  "Ain't it more customary," he asked as the deputy handed him the tray through the wide slot in the door, "for a man's last supper to come at supper time?"

"Well, you see..." Lonnie scratched nervously at the back of his head, "we do it this way, so...um, on account of..."

Stacey gave a short, sharp roll of his eyes.  "It's so you don't shit yourself as bad when you die," he said indurately.  "We're the ones gotta despatch your body, you know.  Bad enough without britches full o' shit."

"You're a delicate little flower, ain't ya," Jayne taunted, smoothly turning so his tray would be out of reach, just in case the nettled deputy decided to snatch it back and spare himself the disagreeable work ahead.  "Too bad I can't ask for seconds," he gave Stacey a wink and sat down on the bed.

"Feiren hunqui," Stacey groused and stalked away.

"You know what else they say happens?" Lonnie asked, the glint in his eye hinting at a fascinating factoid and his utter ignorance of its inappropriateness for his audience.

Jayne reckoned he knew where the mentally prepubescent young man was going and gave Lonnie his most lascivious grin, "You jizz your draw'rs," and sank his teeth into a chicken thigh, tearing the meat off with bestial relish.  It gave Jayne a grin of satisfaction the way Lonnie blushed, giggling like a titmouse as he followed his brother out.  The meat was tasty, Jayne had to admit, especially seasoned with spiteful irritation and baudy humor.  It was like a meal on Serenity, flustering Simon and trading good-natured barbs with Wash.  Jayne lowered the nearly defleshed bone back to the tray and swallowed his mouthful half-chewed.  In an instant the flavor had gone out of his food and the hunger from his stomach, replaced by a cold, stoney realization.

Mal accosted Zoe as she entered the bridge, his color high and nostrils flaring as he stood inches from her.  "Liu kou shui de biaozi he houzi de erzi!  You ever order me around my ship again-" 

"You have my sworn word that I'll toe the line next time one of ours is about to die."

Mal scoffed almost imperceptibly at her flippance.  "I never thought I'd see you breaking orders, Zoe, especially not for such a wenshen."

"You never actually ordered me not to help the wenshen."  Zoe gave away no reaction as Mal shifted his weight away from her.  "And then you came to the briefing.  A pang of conscience draw you in?"

“My conscience is just fine.”

“I'm sure it is, though they say a man can mistake a short memory for a clear conscience.”

"My conscience is clear because I have a long memory, a crystal recollection of everything Jayne is and everything he's done since he changed sides.  That's why you don't see me putting my neck in the noose with him."  Silence and stares.  Mal ruminated on whether or not to tell Zoe of Jayne's principle sin.  If she knew the whole truth, she would never risk kith and kin to save the man.  She may well want to string him up herself.

Zoe's eyes never left Mal's.  “I know what he did," she said plainly.  "At Saint Lucy's.”

Mal stood gobsmacked. “How?”

“River told me, as best she can. Jayne confirmed it on direct.”

There had been a single, hard moment when River's metaphors and poetical non sequiturs had coalesced into a simple, awful truth.  Then the moment in the crew corridor, with Jayne pinned to the bulkhead with Zoe's forearm across his throat. He had frothed at the onrush until she made her accusation. The shame that filled his eyes and the tiny way he answered “yes” punctured Zoe's rage. She released him and he kept himself scarce from her for a few days, no mean feat on a small ship.

Mal leaned back against the pilot's seat, arms crossed over his chest, and appraised Zoe.  “He sells crewmates with less care than I've sold un-broke horses, and knowing all that you still want to gamble your life, and everyone else's, for him?”

“If River can forgive him and he and Simon can come to some understanding, then it's not my place to begrudge him. Besides, I'm only risking myself. Anybody else who wants to help does so of their own will.”

“How pragmatic,” he dead-panned

“There's still a spot open on the squad if you change your mind.”

"I'll have to check my planner."

Not especially concerned with whether the captain was being sincere or sarcastic, Zoe exited the bridge, leaving Mal staring out the forward window across the prairie land that waited, ingognizant, to welcome the body of a man by turns froward and selfless, untrustworthy and noble, vulgar and sincere, but still crew.

  “Okay,” Jayne cleared his throat, face inclined to the plastered ceiling of his cell, “I know you and me ain't exactly close. We've sorta been on a need-to-know basis ever since...well, you know what happened.  I know I don't hold to the rules too good.  Hell, I can commit five deadly sins before lunch.  I just gotta hope I've got enough grace in me to ask for one favor.  If this is gonna be my last hour walking and breathing, I can kinda accept that.  Had to happen eventually. But don't have me die like this, tied up and being killed like some dumb animal. Let me go down fighting. I don't mean dyin' for a cause, like Mal's still trying to do, or anything like that. Let me fight, even if I don't stand a chance of winnin'. Please don't let them just kill me.”

The plan was composed and everyone has their orders.  The assignment for Wash and Kaylee rarely differed much before a job, caper, heist or rescue - make absolutely certain Serenity was ready to fly fast and far the instant she was called upon.  A certain electrical array would not hold up to any more great demands and needed replacing, so the pilot and mechanic sat amidst their tools next to an open access panel in the bridge floor. 

It had been no little relief to Wash to see Kaylee begin to come back to herself and warm again to those around her, even if she still had full venom for Mal and Simon.  “Ya know, it's not like that was your first little scare anyway,” he said, not looking up from the hatch.

“What? What are you talking about?” Kaylee asked as she dug through the tangled-looking mass of wiring to pull up the suspect connector.

“Oh, nothing, nothing at all. I just seem to remember a certain mechanic jumping the bones of a certain pilot his first month on the job, then whispering to him those ominous words, the words which strike fear into the heart of even the most burly man, 'I'm late.'”

Kaylee snorted a little laugh, catching it behind her hand. “Yesoo, I forgot about that.”

“Oh well that's a fine commentary on my sexual prowess,” Wash did his best to look dejected.

Kaylee punched his bicep playfully, “Oh, it ain't like that. I put that all out of my mind when you set your cap for Zoe. Besides, we both just needed to scratch an itch.”

“Didn't feel itchy to me.”

“You're the worst.” She stuck her tongue out at Wash and he stuck his right back out at her with a pbblt. “Tell me something, though. You were in a right state just then. How many beers was it you had that day we made landfall?”

“Nineteen. That's how I rutted up my knee.”

“Oh?” Kaylee smirked knowingly. “And how exactly did you do that?”

“I miscalculated the number of steps down into the galley.”

“And how many steps are there?”

Wash cast his eyes down, “Three.”

“And how many did you think there were?”

“Five.” Wash hid his face in his hands as Kaylee snickered. “That's it, the shame is simply too great to bear!” Rising to his knees, Wash snatched a screwdriver from the toolkit and feigned thrusting it into this abdomen. With a great groan, he drew it across and collapsed onto the decking, twitching in agony. Kaylee just laughed, until her face was flushed and her eyes were set to water.

Suddenly not dead by sepuku, Wash propped himself up on one elbow and watched her for a moment. “Hey, Kaylee?”

“Yeah, Wash?”

“It's good to see you laughing again.”

“Thanks, Wash.”

  "Co ji bai!" the sheriff spat through his teeth as his switched off his cortex, ridding himself of the message from the coffee-skinned spacer woman.  The nerve, the gall, to think they could dictate to him.  'We've got evidence that clears Jayne Cobb,' she had said, 'and we'll be there directly to discuss it.'  For his part, the sheriff did not give a good gorram what these off-worlders thought they had.  They were not just going to waltz in and gainsay the law of Tiberinus, not when the man had been convicted fair and square.  "Stacey!" he hollered.  "Get your pigu in here!" 

"Yeah, what?" Deputy Stacey came in to the office, his indifference obvious.

"Get your brother.  You gotta man to hang."

Mild vexation replaced Stacey's apathy.  He knew his job, loathsome as it was, and did not need to be told how to do it.  "That's tonight." 

"No," the sheriff all but snarled, "it's now."

The voices of the crew had faded in and out as River sat with them at the galley table, the sound ebbing and flowing like waves.  The words had reached her from time to time, leaking into her contemplation.  There was something she wanted, as badly as her fragmented spirit could remember ever wanting anything in her life.  Thoughts around her swirled with the effort to attain their own desire and for a instant the current of their thoughts coalesced with hers in an epiphany .  She could help them and help herself.

In the nebulous depths of her intangible being, something woke apurpose in River.  It opened like the scallop shell, bearing forth Aphrodite.  Love was foremost on River's mind, but it was the goddess Nike to whom she felt owed the most fealty.  It would take no less than wings and a sword to see River to victory.  Her designs were simple, but not without risk, and they hinged on a single opporunity.  If the time slipped past, the chance would be closed to her forever and her life as she knew it, confined and disjointed, surrounded but alone, would be permanent, a world without end, whole unto herself.  For a brief moment, she had known the silence and solace of a single other soul and the pain of the loss of that repose threatened.  She shuddered at the thought and harnessed her mind back onto the path of her plan, the very dreaming of which gave her comfort.

The gallows of Tiberius were a further disappointment to Jayne. It was a sorry enough state to die bound and impotent, in full view of a curious public, but he was being made to do so on something that looked like cheap, modular scaffolding.  He had watched the deputies erect it from the window of his cell, so unimpressed with the structure that he could tell himself it was not for him. Now, the two deputies stood on the main platform while Jayne fought to maintain absolute stillness on the tall, narrow prop in front of it. It sickened his stomach all the more to think that he may plainly fall over and die before the lawmen had to chance to kill him.

The thick rope scratched at Jayne's neck as he surveyed the crowd milling about in the square. Their interest was far from blood-thirsty, as he had expected. A number of the people looked disinterested, like they were standing in a long theater queue. The faces formed a blur of dusty mediocrity – more folk too lazy or stupid to leave their marginal existence for something better. The late afternoon sun was just beginning to angle low into Jayne's eyes when he caught a familiar figure surreptitiously picking a path through the throng of bodies. Kaylee reached the wooden sawhorses lined up end-to-end as a barricade and looked up at Jayne, fret and worry as plain on her honest face as could be.   Kaylee's presence touched off a tourbillion in Jayne's mind as he tried to reason out why she had come. Had she come to lend him moral support, to insure he was not alone amongst strangers when he died? Was there a daring rescue operation imminent? Was a desperate confession of carefully hidden feelings about to burst forth from her soft lips?

When all was said and done, the 'why' really did not matter. Jayne did not want Kaylee to see this death. He would jerk and kick, gasping and flailing, until he finally died and shat himself. If his neck didn't break and the whole thing took too long, the conscientious deputies might even yank down on his feet for a while.

“This ain't no death for a man,” Jayne murmured to the hot breeze that rose from the paved street a dozen or so feet below him.

Mal squinted through the scope as he sighted along the slender barrel of the rifle. From his position on a roof twelve buildings away, Mal had an open and clear view of Jayne in the noose. “This is never gonna work.”

“The beneficiary of this altruistic crusade would say that it is 'insane', which puts it firmly in my territory.” Beside Mal, River stretched nonchalantly, like a bored ballerina. “I don't criticize your plans.”

“The plan would be fine except that it violates several fundaments of reality.”

“Reality is merely an illusion,” River bent to touch her toes, her forehead almost against her knees, “albeit a persistent one.”

“Not doing anything for my confidence here, little one.”

Pressing her palms together, River reached her arms high above her head and arched her back. “Did you pack and load the ordnance according to my formula?”

“Yeah, but-”

“Have you verified the accuracy of the weapon?”

“Yes, but-”

“Then victory is certain.”

“Be that as it may, you're missing one key feature to your brilliant strategy. No one can make this shot. Even Shepherd “Keep 'Em Guessing” Book couldn't shoot out a single strand of rope like you're callin' for.” Mal watched River's total lack of concern as she gracefully reached one hand back to clasp an up-kicked ankle. She stretched the leg high behind her, leaning forward with one arm straight ahead like an arrow, and sighted the shot.

“Three degrees additional ascension and our place in heaven is assured.”

“You're so gorram sure, you take the shot.”

River stared at Mal as if he were slow and she was losing patience, which in fact she was.

“Right, right, the gun touching. Just testing you there.”

“Trust the plan. Trust yourself.” Suddenly, as if startled by a noise, River looked away. “I've got to go.”

“Straight back to Simon, hear?”

“Message received, no reply.” River darted fleetly away across the roof and down the emergency ladder.

“'Trust the plan'? I must be dai ruo mu ji, Mal mumbled as he raised the nose of the rifle three degrees.

Deputy Stacey adjusted the knot of the noose, pulling it under Jayne's left ear.  This would help ensure the neck of condemned snapped cleanly the instant the rope went taunt, speeding up the entire process for the deputies who had to dispatch the body.  Stacey's battered old truck waited a few yards behind the gallows, ready to cart off a corpse in place of its usual cargo of firewood or hay.  The deputy  turned to face the crowd and held up a hand for silence.  "Under righteous law of the moon of Janus," he began in a clear voice, "and the territory of Tiberinus, this man, Jayne Cobb, has been convicted of the willful, malicious murder of full citizen Jeremiah Boone and will hang from the neck until such time as he is dead."  Stacey looked askance at Jayne, "You can make a statement now, if you want."   Two whole days locked up by himself and Jayne had not given a moment's thought to what he might say when this particular moment arrived.  As with most things in his life, he was going to have to improvise.  Drawing himself up striaght, Jayne cleared his throat and spoke out over the heads of the assembly, "I am prepared to meet my maker.  Don't know if my maker is prepared to meet me."       Time was running desperately short when Simon and Zoe finally tracked down the town's sheriff and doctor.  The autocratic elder Gibsons were in the private dining room of an eatery at the end of the main street, seated before a lucheon absurdly large for two men.  It was the sheriff's right, his reward, granted by the founding charter, that on the occasion of the exercise of supreme justice, he be provided a sumptuous -and oversized- meal as thanks from an appreciative populace.  They burst in, unannounced and uninvited.  "You've got to stop the execution," Simon demanded.  Zoe took her position behind his shoulder, the silent enforcer.   "The only thing I gotta do," drawled the sherrif, who barely looks up from his plate, "is get some sauce for these ribs."   "Jayne Cobb did not kill that man.  The autopsy fully exculpates him." "What are you ranting about?" Doc Gibson snapped as he tossed a bone back onto the serving platter.   "The decedant had a ruptured splenic anuerysm."   "And?"   "'And?'!"   "Could've been ruptured in the fight.  That Cobb's got arms like a spike-driver."   "This wasn't a laceration, it was a rupture and it happened at least a week ago."   "How do you figure that?" the sheriff asked, out of his depth in things medical but very certain that no outworlders would gainsay him as long as he had a breath left in his body.   "Had anyone bothered to perform an internal exam, they would have discovered a layer of incongruous adipose tissue covering the splenic artery near the pancreatic tail."   The doctor was equally peremptory, "In case you hadn't notice, Doctor Shonessy, Jeremiah had a pronounced gut. That means he had a great deal of fat in his body."

Simon was stalk-still as he processed this diagnosis. With a burning coldness in his gaze, he locked sharp blue eyes on Doctor Gibson. "Are you actually licensed to practice medicine? And if so, was it through a correspondence course? Or did you get the job with your inflated sense of self-worth and a barber-level understanding of the human body?"  Both of the corpulent despots all but growled at the interposing dilettante.  "The 'pronounced gut' was an abdomen distended with blood.  The fat pad is clearly indicative of the body attempting to seal a small rupture on a pre-existing aneurysm.  The size of it speaks to at least a week of intraabdominal bleeding."    "Meaning what exactly?"   "Meaning," Simon bit back his exasperation, "he died of natural causes entirely dissociated from the trauma of the fight."   "Well, then that's a downright shame," the saturnine sheriff leaned back in his chair and undid the buckle on his belt, "your man being innocent and all like that."   "What do you mean?" Zoe asked firmly, reminding the obesities of her presence.

"Seems to me like our com lines are down.  Yup, I couldn't call over there if I wanted to."  The sheriff smiled broadly with wicked self-satisfaction as beside him, the doctor chuckled derisively.   "We need to stop them."   "I don't know about 'we', son, but I hope you can run in them fancy shoes.  Ma'am."  The sheriff nodded to Zoe and casually retuned to his plate.

An instant of freezing disbelief held Zoe and Simon rooted, then they were gone out the door, racing full-tilt down the dirty street.

"We've got to get to him," Simon shouted with breath needed preciously for the mad pace they had set.

"Dung ee hwar," Zoe grabbed Simon's sleeve and yanked him sideways, nearly toppling him.  His arms whirled for balance as he corrected and followed.  At the end of the last paved street, a large corral stretched for half a block, "Tiberinus Auction Yard."  Several horses milled about, picking at sad bits of grass, but there was nary a buyer nor seller in sight.  Without a word, Zoe began to climb the six foot high rail fence, her long legs a natural advantage.  She swung down, startling the nearest horse.  With gentle hands and a steady eye, she brought the animal to bear, taking it by the halter.  "Can you ride?"

The next stage in the new plan quite clear, Simon ran to the gate, relieved to find it latched but unlocked.  "I have an excellent seat."

"That may be, but can you ride?"

"Yes."  Simon took the halter of the first horse from Zoe.

"Bareback?"

"Do I have a choice?"

"Not unless you see a saddle for the stealing."  Zoe found the next likely horse and, after a moment's coaxing, led it out to where Simon waited.  They threw themselves up onto the horses' backs, Zoe conspicuously more graceful than Simon, and steadied their mounts.  "I'll go to Jayne.  You get back to the ship and get ready for anything."

"Dang ran," Simon put his heels in the horses flank and pulled hard on the halter, steering for Serenity.  

  "The just and virtuous sentence will now be carried out." A ridiculous reflex made Jayne hold his breath as Deputy Stacey braced his boot against the prop under Jayne's feet. A minute's extra oxygen would only prolong his suffering if the deputies had miscalculated the length of rope needed for a man of his weight. If his neck did not snap immediately, he would have an extra minute to bask in his own death. Still, Jayne held his breath.

The quarry lake, with its cliffs and ledges, was strictly forbidden and that was half of its appeal. Jayne stood in his cut-off shorts on a jut of rock some ten yards above the surface of the impenetrably murky water. He glanced nervously back over his shoulder as the older boys continued to deride him. This was it. He had to jump. If he tried to turn back now, his young life would be an endless torment of name-calling and vicious pranks. Jayne's feet moved him toward the edge even as his hands began to shake. The last step took him into the open air. Two seconds later, the water closed over his head and all sound and light left the world.

Deputy Stacey kicked the support out and Jayne dropped.

On his perch above the street, Mal wanted to curse aloud, but his breath was supremely occupied.  He focused on taking deep breaths into his lungs and releasing them as slowly as possible as he monitored the gallows through his scope.  It was one of the core lessons in sniper training - exhaling slows the heart, helping to still the body and steady the hands.  He inhaled again as the deputy finishes speaking and stepped behind Jayne.  There was only one narrow chance to make this shot.  Too early and the hanging would be disrupted, but with Jayne still in the lawmens' custody.  A second late and Jayne would be dead.  The deputy put his boot on the prop and Mal began to exhale.

Deputy Stacey kicked the support out, Jayne dropped and Mal fired. 

The bullet struck the dusty ground several meters behind the gallows, a complete miss.  "Gun ni mar!" Mal hissed and forcefully re-cocked the rifle.  He had had half an hour to perfect the first shot and it had missed.  Now he had to aim and fire in an instant, with the rope shaking as Jayne writhed and convulsed at the end of it.  Mal sighted in the four inch by four inch beam that the rope was tied to.  It was a larger target and if he could put a tight cluster of rounds into the middle of it, it might weaken under Jayne's weight and break.

Mal fired, the shot hit home, and the beam exploded, erupting into a hail of wooden shards.  "Huh."

Jayne fell free to the ground, the noose taut around his neck.  Immediately, Zoe lunged forth from her place at the edge of the crowd and ran to him.  She hauled him to his feet, clawing at the rope as she jammed a shoulder under his armpit.  "I can't carry you, Cobb.  Move your feet!"  Feebly Jayne tried to obey, stumbling as much as walking and threatening to take Zoe down with him every few steps.

The first shot had Deputy Stacey reaching for his weapon and looking for its origin.  The second, destructive shot sent both deputies scrambling down the steps, into the thick of the crowd as it pressed forward to see what was happening.  Fighting their way through the crush was a losing prospect.  By the time they reached the front of the crowd, their prisoner was gone.

Mumbling frantic prayers, Kaylee appeared at Jayne's other side.  She was neither tall nor strong enough to help support him, but she tried. 

"Zou le!" Zoe shouted at her.  "Get the engine running." 

Kaylee raced to the near-by alley where the mule waited, her lug-soled boots tossing up puffs of dust.  Jumping on, she cranked the engine and tore down the street to Zoe and a collapsing Jayne.  Kaylee hopped as quickly off to help Zoe lower Jayne onto the wide, flat cargo platform, tucking his long legs up before they both climbed on, and she gunned the mule down a side street.  

"You were supposed to stay with the mule," Zoe shouted over the engine.  "Where were you?"  Zoe turned and struggled with the noose.  She felt for a pulse.  It was there, almost hidden by the vibrations of the fractious old vehicle, but it felt frighteningly weak.

"I'm sorry...I just..." Kaylee turned down a parallel street, racing to rendezvous with their captain, "I couldn't see him." 

"We'll talk about this later, believe it."

Tears stung at Kaylee's eyes as she hazarded a glance over her shoulder at Jayne.  His color was bad and he lay perfectly still, save when a jostle of the mule made his vacant face tilt to one side.  He was dying, or already dead, she just knew it.  So bound was Kaylee with the ashen face behind her that she nearly ran over Mal.  She whipped her head around in time to see him jump out of the way.  Kaylee gasped as she pounded the brake.

"Tsao gao!  What the hell, Kaylee?!" 

"Zoe's already gonna yell at me later."

Mal climbed on, snugging himself between the two women.  Three people on the mule made for a very tight fit.  It would have been fine fodder for a man's personal time, if not for the hulking gun-hand dying two feet behind him.  "How's he doin'?"

"I think he's still alive."

"You think?"

"I think." 

Within a few minutes, they had put the center of the settlement behind them as they raced for the remote landing site.  For the entire trip, Zoe kept her station, twisted half around to keep one hand on Jayne.  Even as the mule pitched and bounced on the rocky ground, he did not stir.

"Do we go after them?" Deputy Lonnie asked his brother.

"I swear to god, Lonnie, if you was any dumber, we'd have to water you.  Yes, we got after them!  You wanna tell Dad we let him get away?"

"Well, no, but-"

Stacey grabbed Lonnie by one shoulder and shoved him towards the truck.

Simon was prepped and waiting as Zoe and Mal hauled Jayne into the infirmary and on to the examination bed.  Mal turned immediately to the intercom panel at the door.  **beep** "Wash, how's that jammer holding up?

"In a word, fritzy, but it should keep us hidden from anything older than a Minear 3.0."

"Tingdong.  Start the launch sequence.  We need to de-ass this planet with quickness."

"She's hot and ready for you, Cap."**beep**

Jayne's body had barely come to a stop before Simon began scanning him.  Automatically assuming her ostensibly mandatory role as nurse, Zoe strode to the main screen on the wall, "He was semi-conscious when we got him down.  Pulse is up, resps and O2 are low and dropping."

"Cerebral hypoxia, possible larygneal fracture and pharyngeal trauma," Simon thought aloud, looking at the portable scanner. "He needs an airway."  Simon grabbed a lighted scope from a drawer at the same time Zoe produced the intubation kit from another.  "Ai ya," Simon breathed harshly as he examined the tumescent tissue inside Jayne's throat.

"Are you gonna have to trake him?" Mal asked from his vigilant place at the doorway.  Kaylee clung to the opposite doorjamb.

"Not if I can avoid it," Simon grabbed the tube from Zoe and positioned it within Jayne's slack mouth.  With carefully measured force, Simon fed the tube down Jayne's throat, but the swollen tissues pressed hard against him.  "I need cricoid pressure.  Zoe, give me your hand."  Her hand was hovering over Jayne before Simon could look up to reach for it.  He placed her strong fingers on Jayne's adam's apple and pressed, "Back and up.  If I can't get him intubated in the next 30 seconds, I'll have to crike him." 

"Kaylee," Mal tore his attention away from Simon's efforts, "you get up to the bridge and keep that jammer on if you have to hold the wires together with your teeth."

"But, Cap'n-"

"Now!"

With one last pained look at Jayne's still form, Kaylee turned and sprinted for the bridge.

The pressure of Zoe's hand bought Simon the scintilla of space he needed to cautiously coerce the tube down Jayne's throat, deep into his trachea.  Zoe handed him the end of the tube from the reserve oxygen stored below the bed, which Simon attached in one fluid movement, perfected by repetition.  Air hissed through the tube, raising the plane of Jayne's chest slightly.  "Chest expansion," Simon announced.  He grabbed his stethoscope from its nonchalant place across the back of his neck and listened to the lung, "Breath sounds good bilaterally."

"Sat's coming up," Zoe declared.  In the doorway, Mal began to breathe again too.

"I'll start the high-def scan, to tell us if he needs surgical repair."  With Jayne stable, Simon counted heads. “Where's River?”

“I sent her back to you.”

“You what?!”

Mal hit the com again. **beep** “Wash, did River come back to the ship on her own?”

“Is she missing?”

“That's a no.” **beep** Mal could barely get a calloused hand out to stop Simon as he stripped off his gloves and tried to rush from the infirmary. “Where are you going?”

“I've got to find River,” Simon said, aghast.

“You've got a patient on the table.”

“He's stable.”

“Zoe or I can go look for her.”

“I have a better chance of finding her.”

“What if Jayne takes a turn?”

“Zoe, you got him?”

“Got him.”

“Zoe's got him.” Simon snatched the com unit from Mal's belt, causing Mal's hand to reflexively go to his gun. “Call me if his pulse ox drops below 85!” Simon yelled back as he raced through the ship.

  "Why am I running?" Simon's mind demanded to know as the prairie sun made to scald him.  "The mule was sitting right there.  I forewent an all-terrain vehicle and am running to town on foot."  Arms pumping and feet pounding in three-eight time, two more bubbles of thought burst, "Because I don't know how to drive it and I didn't have the keys," and "Gang zie shen for six years of track."  He was a lost cause with a ball in his hand, but Simon could run.

Mal let out a roar as he slowed to a frustrated stop on the cargo ramp, the back of Simon shrinking at a surprising clip.

Kaylee raced down the stairs from the bridge, Wash near behind, "Fa sheng shen me shi le?"

"River's bugged out and damn shazi's took off after her," Mal gritted out, staring venomously.

"Alone?  By himself?"

"Yes, by himself!  Who else is that-" the mule's starting holler severed his lambast.  Mal spun around just in time to watch Kaylee speed past.

“Gorram it, am I still captain of this ship?!”

“You'll always be captain of my heart,” Wash declared.

“Go be un-funny on the bridge, Wash, we're out of here the second the first one of them comes back.”

Embers smoldered in Simon's chest and a fist was clenched in his side, and the town was still damnably far away, as the first real dubiety began to settle on Simon's pounding heart.  Suddenly, like a noisy, dirty valkyrie, Kaylee pulled the mule alongside Simon in his ardent run. “Hop on!”

“Does this mean you forgive me?”

“You really want to talk about that now?”

Simon jumped on behind Kaylee, holding her waist as fear of being thrown off and run over proved more powerful than embarrassment or decorum.

If Simon had been honest with Mal, or even himself, he would admit that he did not know where to begin looking for River.  She was just one small body in the sprawl of a town, assuming she had even stayed in town.  Something inside Simon told him that she had while a seething, protective, brotherly feeling told him to look for Jin to find River.  Keeping to alleys and deserted back streets, they meandered through the town as unobtrusively and inconspicuously as possible.  Scanning the marketplace and peeping through the windows of shops had proved fruitless.  Time was moving faster than they were, with no way to know how long Mal would wait for the last of the lambs to come home.  Finally, Simon thought he spied a familiar figure in a cafe.  He and Kaylee entered as casually as they could, moving along one wall and scanning for a boy matching Simon's description

“Is that him over there?” Kaylee asked.

Simon fixed his eyes where she pointed and could not stop his jaw as it dropped. “That's not a 'him'.” In the corner of his vision, he saw Kaylee cover her mouth with both hands as she gasped. The skinny 'boy' in the out-sized clothes, with black hair cut short up around the ears, stared with wide, chocolate brown eyes to where Jin sat and smiled, making time with a lanky blond girl with a button nose. Simon watched River's fists clench as Jin leaned over and kissed the girl. Eyes shimmering with tears, River turned and hurried out.

“C'mon,” Kayle said, dragging Simon by the arm. “We'll pick her up out back. You gotta act like you didn't see any of that.”

“She's my sister and she's upset-”

“She just got her heart stomped on and doesn't need you and your jing-tzahng mei yong-duh tongue right now. Just let me talk to her.”

Kaylee pulled the mule up beside River, who dropped out of her run at the sound of their approach. “Hey, honey, I almost didn't recognize you. We need to get back to the ship ma shang or Cap'n'll leave without us.”

Lips set in a firm line, River only nodded and climbed on between her brother and her friend.  They rode back to Serenity in silence.

Life is uncertain.  Time is irrelevant.  Even the concepts of light and dark become stupifyingly difficult for a brain deprived of oxygen.  Jayne heard and saw, or imagined, he could not be sure.  Comprehension was completely beyond him.  Hands touched his body at some point, faces floated in front of him, then the darkness came up around him again, as if he were in tar, slow, heavy and inescapable.  Sometimes sinking, sometimes floating, words found him like water snakes in a primal river.

"What you won't do to avoid work.  Enjoy your sopor, 'cuz you're on septic vac til further notice."

"I've known necrotizing faciitis, and you, sir, are no necrotizing faciitis."

"Jayne Cobb, you've been judged and found wanting."

"Oh, that's just mean."

There was quiet cry --wasn't there?- and voices hushed politely. River's whisper sounded close enough that her breath should have been warm on his ear," Ni bai sha she le? Rang wo yong shu lai she ni fu huo," before she faded into the murk as well.

An alien individual sat tight to the wall of the bottom step of the rear stairs.  Freezing at the top, Mal reached for his gun.  Being a three days in the black, however, he did not have it.  Irrespective of that, he still had his strength - command presence.  "Don't take kindly to stowaways," he warned

"Not stowaway, castaway," the dove-like voice sniffled quietly.

"River?"  Cautiously, Mal descended, his eyes adjusting to the dim.  Simon and Kaylee had, separately, taken pains to avoid him outside of any interaction inescapably job-related.  He had only had report from Wash that River had been recovered, she having kept herself entirely to herself since, which suited him fine.  Now he found her sitting alone, staring at nothing in particular, her hair trimmed sharp like a pixie's.  Something had definitely happened.  Not that he cared.  The girl and her brother and his own besotted mechanic had been more than their fair share of trouble.  Still, she did cut a pathetic figure, sat there all downcast.  He sat on the step below hers.  "Who cut your hair?"

"I did, then Inara."

Mal did not relish the idea of River with sharp things in her hand, whether she meant to use them on herself or someone else.  "We gonna need a 'no touching scissors' rule around here?"

"It was a razor.  Fell out of the Shepherd's bag."  It has lain there on the floor of the passenger dorm corridor, a spark of inspiration, a beacon drawing her.  It was slightly open, just enough for the blade to glint in the light, parted and tempting like the legs of a lover.  River picked it up, holding it with gentle guidance like a cello bow, as it spoke to her.  'I am here,' it said, 'I will help you.  Trust in me.'

"So, what's his name?"

The beamish voice yanked River out of her memory.  Her head immediately snapped to Mal, 'How did you know?' so plain on her face.

"Can't think of anything else would make a seventeen year old do something so drastic," he smiled beatifically.

"Jin," the pang of adolescent sorrow dominated the syllable.

"Ah well, I wouldn't worry to much on the losing then.  Jin's a girl's name anyway."

A grin nearly animated River's mouth, but she trapped it, the effort making a cute pout of her lips, "No, it's not."

"Of course it is.  I had a great-aunt Jean."

"That's not the same; homonym."

"What did you call me?"

The grin outfoxed River this time and grew into a full-blown smile.  Mal smiled too, to see the girl under all the hardship and sorrow.  They sat in silence for a while, listening as the climate control cycled on with a dull chunk and air whispered through the ducts.

"Incendiary round.  Nice touch, by the way."

"Even Shepherd "Keep 'Em Guessing" Book couldn't make that shot."

"That was in the plan?  You knew I'd miss, but you let me take the shot anyway, and you reckoned I'd shoot for the beam next?"

River shrugged one shoulder.

"Sure'n I don't know what's going on anymore."

"You never did."

Someone was singing when Jayne reached the surface again.  "Oh, you've got green eyes/ Oh, you've got blue eyes/ Oh, you've got gray eyes/ And I've never seen anyone quite like you before/ No, I've never met anyone quite like you before."  It was surely no church hymn Jayne had ever heard, so he reasoned that he must still be alive.  The next thing he was consciously, and immediately, aware of was the fire in his throat.  Yes, he was definitely alive.  He rallied the strength to creak open one eye.  The infirmary shifted into focus.  His gaze landed on River where she sat on the counter bed, looking seraphic with a gold scarf, surely one of Inara's, draping her head.  "Ah," she said knowingly, "the sleeper wakes."

Simon appeared above Jayne, pulling his up his eyelids and blinding him with a vindictive sun in the form of a pen-light.  "Don't try to talk.  You've got a tube down your throat to help you breath.  Do you understand?"  Jayne's head twitched in the affirmative.  Holding up two fingers, like V for victory, Simon asked, "Show me how many fingers you see."  Lifting his forearms from the bed, Jayne held up two fingers, one on each hand.  Simon smirked, "Prognosis is good."

The ship was largely settled for the night when a noise caught Jayne's ear.  From his compulsory place on the bed, Jayne lifted his head to see Zoe slid into the infirmary.  She was already dressed to retire, a style in which she would normally not be seen, in a silky kimono that stopped scandalously shy of mid-thigh.  She came to stand beside his shoulder, "How are you feeling?"

Jayne wobbled a spread hand.  The breathing tube had been removed, which felt rather like vomiting a welding torch, but he still could not speak.  A clutch of scrap paper and a pen sat on the counter nearby to facilitate communication. He was prone to breathing troubles and fainting spells and so was shackled by Simon's orders to stay in the infirmary on the monitors. 

In atypical tenderness, Zoe's hand came to rest on Jayne's arm.  "Good work not dying.  The place wouldn't have been the same without you."  Jayne looked from Zoe's hand back to her face, at the light in her eyes he simply could not rate.   "You say something sexual; I say something violent. You try to see me naked in the shower; I try to break you nose.” She picked a piece of fluff from his hair with dexterous fingertips and smiled down at him softly. “I like the system we've got.” Moving down to the end of the bed, Zoe trailed her fingers along Jayne's leg, “Actually there's a lot about you I like.” She stood poised with her hands on the sash of her kimono. “Now is your chance, Jayne Cobb. After years of chasing, it's time for the kill. All you have to do I say it, say you want me.” With that, she threw open her kimono, exposing her creamy bronze glory. Zoe tried not to smirk as Jayne's eyes bulged out of his head. “Don't you want me, Jayne?”

Jayne's mouth opened, but only a gravelly rattle issued forth.

Zoe snapped her kimono closed and tied the sash tightly. “Well, I can't say I'm not a little disappointed. Maybe in the next life. Good night, Jayne.”

Jayne grunted and groaned, frantically reaching for his pen, as Zoe turned on her heel and strode out, laughing wickedly.

In the cockpit, Mal's head snapped towards the strange cacophony in his ship. “What in the name of Tien and sonny Yesoo is that?”

“That,” Wash could not help but smirk, “if I had to venture a guess, would be my Zoe's sadistic sexy-evil laugh.”

“You might have to stop smiling there, chippy.”

“Shen me?”

“If you're in here with me, who's she doing sexy-evil laugh for in there?”

Two weeks since taking off from Tiberinus for the final time, there was laughter in the dim evening light of the galley as Serenity's crew gathered together for their supper, though the din was missing a certain baritone. His voice still suffering the effects of the aborted hanging, Jayne was forced to meter his talking, saving his vocal strength for only the choicest snipes and innuendo.  Swallowing was difficult from time to time, so due attention had to be paid to thoroughly chewing solid food.  They were fair exchanges, Jayne knew, for the price of his life. 

Mal took a sip from his mug to keep from choking as he maintained the effort to talk, laugh and eat simultaneously. “I know the womenfolk accuse us of being led around by the zhandou de yi kuai rou, but damn, Jayne, don't you even get a vote?”

Another wave of laughter crested and Jayne swatted it down with his hand. Everyone quieted a little to listen.  Jayne spoke with a gravely hoarseness that wore off a bit more each day, “I ain't tumbled Wash yet.”

Tittering and eating simultaneously caught up with Inara too, who coughed around a dainty morsel of bread. Mal patted her back, his hand lingering warmly between her shoulders. All eyes turned to Wash, who sat looking something between horrified and dejected. “You said it was special, you said I was the only one!” Sobbing dramatically, fists over his eyes, Wash turned against his wife's shoulder.

“There, there, baobei, he said the same thing to me.”

Now the crew could hardly speak for want of breath as the hilarity overtook them again. At the other end of the table, River basked in the golden, sparkling euphonia. Each peel of joyous noise was like the ringing of a bell, clear and bold through the mist. Another note joined it in harmony. Next to her, beneath the table, Kaylee reached over tentatively and took Simon's hand. Tentatively too, Simon interlaced his fingers with hers and dared a sidelong glance to see her smile.

Silently, Serenity glided through the vast, black expanses of space, her heart glowing.

  Fin @;~',~ Words alone do not do enough to thank that marvelous blaxploitation librarian Adverbia Jones for all her help, especially not my words. Dedicated to Alan Francis, who is now officially a bigger procrastinator than me.