Take me out to the black...by badger

She opens her eyes in total black, and for a moment there is a cold coil around her heart, she knows her eyes are open, why can't she see anything? Slowly she comes back to her body, the sleep fleeing her mind.

The first to arrive are the sounds, the thrum of her girl's engines, and the gentle purr of the life support. She loves these sounds, like a lullaby, "Mechanic, keep me healthy and I will keep you from the black, keep you warm and in the light." A gentle voice, like a sister, made up of hums and huffs, clicks and revs.

"No power in the verse" comes another voice from the black, and the sound of shots. A memory of horrible ripping pain, the hot feeling of her own blood splashing through her fingers. She curls protectively around her belly. What was she thinking? So far away from home, from her pa, the shop and the boys…what was she thinking? Captain said that they would be far from the core worlds, far from help, very far from the light.

"You ever been raped?" the voice continues calm and terrible, and the feeling of complete helplessness reaches around her in the darkness. She crunches down in the comforter that Inara has lent her, her hands bringing the burgundy and gold cloth closer around her shoulder. It smells of cinnamon, ginger and something citrusy that she can't identify.

Inara had insisted she use it when she had mentioned how warm and bright it was in her shuttle, and how you wouldn't think it was even part of the same ship.

"There is a lesson to be learned there tien mei" Inara's hands gently brushing out the rat's nests in her hair. "One can be part of something, and be totally different." Easy for her to say she thinks, Inara being so glamorous and fancy, could stand out on a sun.

Her pa would say Inara was a worldly woman, full of knowledge and thinking, someone to watch, someone to be careful of.

"You got to unnerstand girl, all folk ain't all like us here, they run by their own governors" a voice likes a well running internal combustion engine. A rough voice, strong and dependable like the man they belonged to. "Core worlders care nothing for the likes of us, we fix their engines, mend their drivers and that's fine. You get too close, and think you're one of em, and you will most likely find yourself left out in the black without fuel or air"

"I will let her die" the shaky but defiant voice of the doctor grabs at her memory from the darkness. Hot tears and even hotter blood splash down her face, the cold feeling of fear seeping up from the pain in the center of her.

The devil's own face roaring at her, the smell of burning as the fire eats up the air as it rushes toward her. The sound of Zoe hitting the deck wet and broken, the captain limping into the hold bleeding and burned. Her girl wounded, lying dead in space with its engine dark and cold, as the shuttle pulls away from her, and her helpless just watching them all die.

"It's a frail thing," the voice is cultured, filled with gentle humor and girlish glee as River hands a model of Serenity made of paper and metal foil to her. The details are amazing, and she wonders how River could have done it, learned what her girl looked like from so many angles. "Paper dolls," River says happily clapping her hands, "no good in a storm, but see how it catches the light!"

"It's just a ship" the long haired mechanic grins, his hands fast at work on her dress, "but if you wanna see the engine then lets go." He smells like sweat, and twistweed and she thinks he is too quick to agree to let her see the ships heart, he didn't even study on her a moment, just her smile, her legs and he is opening doors.

Pa would of switched her something terrible if he knew she was carousing with a stranger so, but he would of beaten the mechanic even worse for letting a stranger into his ship's heart without being more careful. It is beautiful, the heart of Serenity, that's what the boat is called, Serenity. She wants to touch it, hear it sing, see it turn, but all to quickly the clumsy hands of the mechanic are back fumbling at her dress and his eyes so beautiful in the sunlight, here in the engine room are oddly dark.

"So far from the light" the voice is stronger now, and the cold fights to get past the comforter into her bones. "To die out here in the black, away from your family, away from anyone who could be a help to you."

The cold bites through the comforter, gets into her bones, and starts her teeth to chattering. She whimpers curling tighter around a fire in her belly that tears and moves like something alive

A gun barrel so large she could pilot Serenity right into it, a black sun that yawns like a hungry mouth pointing straight at her. "Say it, there is nobody who can help you.."

"Who!" she cries, tears forcing themselves from behind tightly shut eyes

"You are talking to Serenity" the voice is again soft and comforting, made of ship sounds and River's voice.

"No…No…No" she buries her head in the comforter

"And Kaylee...Serenity is very unhappy" a face, calm and serene, like when momma use to read to her from a ships manual. "But it's going to be okay, you are going to make it all okay." The face smiles and its eyes are the doctor's and its smile is Book's.

"He looks better in red" the voice is now all River's and it is cutting, and shooting and the face that is Serenity becomes covered in blood. The face is shocked and terrified, it chokes as the wounds take it by surprise. "Kaylee!!!!" and the voice is Momma's the day she left."

There is blood, on her hands and on her face, she tries to run to her girl but Serenity is dying, and screaming, she tries to hide, tries to pull herself into nothingness, hide in the black away from the terrible screaming and ...

She opens her eyes, the room is not black, dim under the minimal ship lights, but not black. She can see her music cube, the ruffles of her pretty pink dress that the Captain bought for her on Persephone, and the golden lanterns on the comforter that she lays tangled in.

She is wet, and shaking, and her eyes feel grainy from crying. It was a dream, a terrible dream, but nothing more than that she thinks as she untangles from the comforter. Standing slowly, she gets her bearings, and steps into her coveralls, the warm feel of the green grease stained cloth makes her smile, and the deep thrum of the deck plates tell her that her girl's heart is turning, and that Serenity is soaring through space. As she looks around her room the dream becomes like smoke in the light, a fading fear that becomes nonsense in the real of waking up. She takes a deep slow breath to chase away the last shrouds of the nightmare, and the dry cool air of Serenity rushes into her lungs.

Air that stings the back of her throat, air that makes her eyes tear a little. Air that says only one thing to her and that one thing is fire.

She is all energy now, pulling the coveralls around her waist and belting its arms around her middle. She races up the ladder out of the room, pausing to pull a queller out of its compartment. Fire, the most terrible thing to happen in a boat, no way to calm it except vacuum, which would probably kill a crew before it saved it.

"Not again," she breathes racing toward the crew common room, "not ever, not to my girl." There is smoke in the throughway, and the sound of Serenity's scrubbers roar at her as she bounds into the room. "Mechanic, help me!" they growl, "make it right, fix the problem."

She collides with something, someone, bony arms and the smell of talcum, and they both crash hard to the floor, the queller bouncing out of her hands.

"Whoa!" Jayne shouts, "Tzao Gao Kaylee! What in the gorram hell are you doing???"

She rolls off the person she collided with, and soft strong hands gently sit her up.

"Are you all right child?" Book's voice, his face right in front of hers, a lopsided smile and dark eyes coming into focus, he rubs his arm first, and then stands rubbing his backside.

"Sorry shepard. I smelled fire," she says, as Book helps her to her feet. "I…"

The room is bright, and they all seem to be there, Wash looking at her with a toothy smile, and Zoe smiling as well. Book, Jayne, and the Captain grin at her like men who can barely keep a joke from bursting their sides. Only the doctor isn't smiling, he looks sheepish and ashamed, a blue striped apron tied around him, his leg braced in metal and plastic.

"What" she says smiling defensively, she can feel the blush burning in her cheeks and rushing down her neck. She looks from one face to the other, trying to find what everyone is so gorram pleased with.

"Maybe little Kaylee is right doc," Jayne growls picking up the queller, he holds it up to the doctor who is blushing almost as red as she is. "She just might of brought the one kitchen device that might help your cooking." She notices the cook top and the thick black mass smoking on it, and suddenly it all becomes clear.

"I was shot, I have an excuse" the doctor says trying to bat the queller away, "anyway I like my no food well done!"

She feels the laugh before she does it, and it joins the rest of the crew's, even the doctor can't help himself.

"Seems to me a man in the top three percentile should be able to heat up a mess of proteins" Captain says as he looks down at the ruined breakfast. "Heck, even Jayne here makes a passable Johnny cake, and he is barely upright."

"Yeah" Jayne snarls, the pride on his face fading, "hey...what's that supposed to…"

"Come on Simon," Inara's voice warm and soothing, "lets clean this up, and start again." She hands him a cleanser and they both begin to scrape the cook top.

"Careful Doc," the captain says as he moves around the table to stand by his mechanic, "you might not be able to afford her fees." Inara shoots him a look of daggers, and he turns away from her to look down into the little mechanics eyes. The good-natured smile fades, and his eyes become serious, searching for something in her face.

"Smoke wasn't enough to trigger the sniffers Kaylee," he says gravely. "No way a body could smell, the smoke that far away, shepherd poured coffee on the mess before it could even flame up. How did you do it?"

"Just did is all Captain, guess I am a might skittish after the fire," the words seem to flow out of her mouth, "Ship told me, told me to set to mending, set to fixing. I just went where it told me." She met his eyes, hoping that she was making sense to him, not babbling like River.

They eyes smiled first, she always liked that about the Captain, how his mouth had to catch up to the smile in his eyes.

"That's cause you're a genius girl" he says softly, and turns her around to whisper into her ear, "you're a prefects price of a mechanic, just don't tell Jayne, cause he thinks he's my favorite." The words pour into her like sunlight around a moon, and the blush comes back hotter this time.

He gently shoves her toward the fresher, and gives her a gentle swat to send her on her way.

"Wash up Kaylee, you smell like ship" he chuckles, "which smells so much better than breakfast, we all might come to the notion of taking a bite outta you."

"Kaylee with rice!" Wash says menacing her with eating sticks as she runs toward the fresher.

She opens the fresher port, and is face to face with soft brown eyes, and a smile that seems to ask questions. River in a cotton dress her face open and smiling, and for an instant, the slightest wisp of darkness crosses Kaylee's heart.

"Kaylee?" River questions stepping around her, "you okay?"

River is different now, thinks Kaylee, like now she is looking at Kaylee with her own eyes, seeing her. Not like before Arial, when she saw her and the million other pictures that swarmed Rivers mind. How could she be afraid of this girl? The darkness in her heart passes, but it leaves a stain of shame and regret.

"River," Kaylee begins, and she reaches to take River's hand "what I said before sweetie, about being scared of you…"

"No" River giggles, "not scared of me silly. Scared of the darkness, scared of the black, that's nothing to be shamed about girl." Is it Kaylee's imagination, or does River's voice have just a hint of something else, something strong, that sounds like a good internal combustion engine. She smiles, feeling the weight of the shame vanish like a nightmare.

"Everyone is scared of the black" she say matter of factly and reaches down into a pocket of her dress. "That's why I brought the moon and some stars" She opens her fist in front of Kaylee's face, to reveal a multicolored ball, and tin jacks.

"Jacks," Kaylee says surprised, "I am great at this game, I can get to eightsies easy."

"Dunno Kaylee," River says with a wry smile, "I am a genius after all, after breakfast?"

They shake on it and River goes to join Simon and Inara, Kaylee steps into the fresher and turns to close the port, she stops for a moment and looks at crew in the common room. The view of them working toward breakfast, the feeling of Serenity well and flying, this is where she needs to be, in the light.

"Keep me well mended mechanic," the engines say, "and I will keep you in the light."

She smiles and closes the door.