I don't want to call this a "missing scene", but here is a little snippet I'm interjecting into "Objets in Space." Not even long enough to be a vignette, this may not even be enough for a snippet, but I thank you for reading and hey, how 'bout some feedback.

"To the left. No, your left. Okay, now very gently pull that aside."

Zoe did nothing to hide her tense discomfort. Why she was always tapped for medic duty, she would never know. "This is really not my area of expertise, Doctor. I tend to be putting these into people, more than the other thing."

"Can I mop your brow?" Wash hovered around them like a nervous insect. "I am at the ready with the fearsome brow-mop." Trying very hard to be unobtrusive in his helpfulness, Wash reached out to swab the sweat from his wife's brow as she struggled.

The forceps, slippery metal prize clutched tightly, finally popped free. "You got the bullet. Okay, I'm just gonna pass out for a minute, but you're doing great." Simon felt woozy and not a little queasy, as though his stomach had crawled into his skull and his brain had drained into his belly. It was something of a head trip to watch forceps, retractors and long-fingers burrowing and poking around in his thigh, just as it wasn't technically challenging to provide the suction himself but strange and unsettling to think about.

"You want something for the pain?" Zoe's cool voice snapped Simon out of his drowsy introspection. She seemed to feel more comfortable with the chore of suturing than she had had extracting the bounty hunter's bullet. Simon glanced down at his thigh, which was remarkably blurry. Sure enough, Zoe had irrigated the wound and was doing a very serviceable job of sewing it closed. There would be a scar, a vibrant, squiggly, puckered line on his otherwise immaculate body. He was a bit behind on that score as it was. Zoe, Mal, and Jayne probably had a hundred between them. He shrugged mentally, it wasn't as though anyone would see it. Well, maybe, with a little luck… "Doc?"

Simon had drifted again. Zoe was finished with her work and was drying her hands as she waited almost patiently for his answer. "No, I'm pretty…floaty just now, but if you could prep four of pericodone." Wash had gone, he noticed. "I think I want to lay here for a while. Can you get someone to help me to my bunk in an hour or two?"

"Sure thing, Doc." Zoe toed the switch on the floor to lower the head of bed until Simon lay mostly flat. "You okay, you're not going to fall off?" He shook his head weakly. "You try to rest now."

More than happy to comply with orders, if only this once, Simon let his head to tip to one side and his heavy eyelids close. His sleep was sound and deep until River's melodic voice swam like a water snake through his brain, "I'll be your bounty, Jubal Early, and I'll just fade away." His tiny sister, powerful and vulnerable, sacred and profane-

"I'm turned wolf's head, you realize, a runagate of great value." River's voice, her real voice, brought Simon sharply back to the surface of his murky consciousness. He smiled rather doltishly to her as she stood silent and still at his bedside, examining his critically. "That was really dumb."

"I know."

"We already have heroes here."

"I know."

"Then why did you get yourself shot?"

His verbal capacity too severely suppressed by the drugs, Simon threw his arms around River's waist, pressing his face to her stomach as he pulled her close. She sighed and draped her arms around his shoulders. "Please don't leave me."

She kissed his tousled black hair. "I'm right here."

"No, I don't ... I mean-"

"I know." River held Simon tightly in return, "And I'll be right here."