The room is always spotless and blinding-bright. The only color I could see was white, even in the places where the light didn’t reach. I am on my back on a soft bed that might have been comfortable if I hadn’t been wet with sweat and full of fear.

Suddenly, there is a whirring sound in the distance, coming from an unknown direction, but coming at me nonetheless. This sound, like that of a horde of angry bees, grows loud and louder still until I hear nothing more and a jolt of pain crashes though my head. A needle is lowered slowly, slowly over my open eye.

Before the needle can go any further, I wake up or don’t recall the remainder of the dream when I do wake up later on. This dream is always the same and always sickeningly realistic. I always wake-up cold and sweaty, the beginnings of a headache peppering my mind and muscles. I have been this way since I was 12-years old and my brother had saved me from GroingTavelers, the place I’d been taken to as a child. The dreams I had were of the tests that the scientists had done to me for the four years I had been held prisoner there. *** “Wake-up, Audra!” shouts someone over my head in the outer mists of the dream world. My eyes shoot open to find Murmur, my roommate, looking over me with an expression of worry. His stocky, white hair stood out on end and his tired eyes bore into mine when he finds out that he has—finally—awaken me. I am glad that he has, as I am always glad the dream ends abruptly. “Thanks for waking me,” I say and sit up, rubbing my eyes as if to make sure they are still there.

Murmur looks up at me from his 4-foot frame, his hands on his hips and his lips pursed. Apparently, I had awakened him as well, and he wasn’t all too grateful about it. I had met the little man when I first moved to The Colony, a vast floating island hanging a few thousand feet from Earth. He had let me move in with him and his wife, Yolanda as long as I kept the house clean and watched their animals when they were gone out. I took the offer, pocketing the money that I had saved for the future and its unknowable occurrences.

“Upsha dinleg takoo!” he grumbled in his native tongue, Clandise. I had heard this phrase before, many times. It meant “Humans and their dreams.” I’d asked Yolanda about it before and she laughed for a good half hour before she was able to tell me what it meant. The Cland was a race of human like people that came to us from the very edges of the Milky Way. There weren’t many of them and they had traded with the Earth’s government to be able to stay in the Milky Way. They had given us humans some of their most advanced technology and we had given them a place to live, The Colony. The Colony at first was inhabited only by the Cland and had been named thus by our scientists. The island was connected to Earth by oxygen tubes and water funnels, so that they would be able to breathe and eats. They were (and are) a gentle race who’s home planet became overruled by their neighboring enemy, the Jreniliba, a species of humans living out on a smaller yet near identical planet like that of the Clad. The funny thing was, that all the Clad were no taller than four feet in height. The Jreniliba were exactly like we people of Earth: some were four-feet tall; some were seven-feet tall. No one knew why the Clad trusted us to behave differently than the Jreniliba did. Their reasoning was, that even though we did look exactly alike one another, the Jreniliba did not act the way humans did. Humans, though violent at sometimes, had a kindness here and there and a state of compassion that the Jreniliba lacked all together. In a word, some of the Clad said, Jreniliba were animals.

“So sorry to have awaken you, Murmur. I didn’t know that I would have my dream tonight,” I said honestly. It was true: I didn’t know when I would have the dream.

“It is alright, Audra. No harm done. It is time for you to get out of bed anyway. Time for your brother to come,” Murmur said before turning to leave the room.

I sighed and stood up, looking around at my packed-and-ready belongings. Today my brother, Malcolm Jenkins, captain of his ship Serendipity, was coming to get me off the colony and I would live with him and his crew aboard ship. He claimed he’d been looking for me for a long while and that he wanted me to be where he could keep a close eye on me. I wanted to be away from the suffocating beauty of The Colony and my brother and his ship were a good way to get out of there fast.

After making Murmur (who had gone back to bed) and Yolanda breakfast, I drank me a cup of coffee and took a shower. There really was no way of knowing what type of ship Mal had, but any transport would be welcome. Still, it was a good idea to take a good shower, as there might not be any running water on the ship. By the time I was ready to go, it was 9:00 in the morning. Yolanda had gotten up and given me the going away present that she’d made: 200 of my favorite chocolate macadamia nut cookies, a month’s supply of dark, favorable Clad brewed coffee, and a little kitten that I’d become fond of named simply “Kitty.” Since Mal wasn’t due to arrive for another half hour, I played cards with Yolanda as she gave me advice of what to do and not to do once I left The Colony. She wanted me to stay unsoiled by men, yet she wanted me to return one day with children. Noticing the humor in what she said, we both began to laugh.

“Audra, you must take care not to become a slave to a man. This is what I mean to say. There will be someone or something out there for you. You were not meant to live confided in these walls, taking care of animals and cleaning after people. There has always been an aire of adventure about you and, though I do not know where it comes from, it is there and it is strong. Make sure to exercise that want or I will say that you have failed me.” The look on her tiny face showed power and wisdom. I respected her advice, as she had never been wrong before, and a part of me wished that I didn’t have to go.

“I’ll try my best, Yolanda. I promise you.” I gave her a hug, a human gesture she’d gotten used to from me, and stood to leave. My brother, as usual, was quite late.

“You best do that. I will know,” she said and winked.

I went to the kitchen and hugged Murmur, Yolanda giggled from behind me. “Go on, Audra, and leave me at peace. Do as my wife says, for she does KNOW,” he said, pushing me away from him stubbornly. Yolanda smacked him on the arm just as a knock landed on the door. I said my final good byes and walked quickly outside.

“Hey, little brother,” I said to Mal and hugged him.

“Right back at ya, little sister.” He had brought his not quiet so old army buddy along with him. “Hey Zoë. Long time,” I said and hugged her. She didn’t say anything, just wrapped me up in her strong hold, squeezing the breath out of me.

* * *

When Mal rescued me from GroingTavelers, he and his business partner, Zoe Harrington, had taught me how to read and all of the other things that people my age knew. Zoe had been like an older sister and she raised me, even though she was only four years my senior, to be a lot like her. I had some things like my brother, though. One of my “talents” was hitting a moving target blindfolded and, as I got older, I adapted to his adventure filled life. When the war between the Jreniliba and the humans started, Mal and Zoe were called into action and I was left to look after the office they shared for their gun-selling business.

The Jreniliba eventually burnt the place to the ground and I was left with no-where to go and no money to go there with. I made my way to Quintilla-Jaus, thinking to find work in the only area on Earth that hadn’t been hit by the war. Q-Jaus was the sister island to Q-Levin, and both were known to house schools and villages built for the sole purpose of Companions and Escorts. I didn’t really want the job of either, but a nice cleaning job or cooking job would do nicely. Right at the gate, I was told there were no openings for “my kind.” After traveling the 300 miles to Q-Jaus, I was tired and frustrated and the “your kind” remark drove the nail directly in. My fist contacted with the man’s face and, before I knew what was going on, none of the three guards was standing. A flying carriage came in my direction at a break-neck speed and a middle-aged woman stepped down.

“How would you like a job?” she asked. “That’s what I’m here for,” was my reply.

She gave me the job of “bodyguard to working companions” and I was paid enough to make even the world’s most greedy person happy. All I had to do was travel out with the companions when they had a client to make sure that nothing went wrong. My first job was a student named Jeralla D’Aruna who eventually left the school. My final job lasted for as long as the war. Four years, from the time I was 19 until I turned 23, I was Inara Shelly’s bodyguard. The reason for my dismissal was the fact that Inara left Q-Jaus and she paid me to go with her.

At first, I went along with her to see if I could find my brother or Zoe. I found neither and Inara found fame. We were good friends and she asked me if I wanted to stay. Perhaps she noticed I was growing reckless with my line of work, I never knew how she knew I needed to leave her employ, only that I did. I departed on good terms and she paid me three months in advance, wishing me luck in finding my brother.

After a year of searching, I was nearly 25 years old and again in need of a job. I’d exhausted my resources with no luck and had little money to live by, much less to continue my somewhat expensive search for Mal. One night, I stowed away on a small ship whose destination I’d discovered was the moon KR579, the last place I’d tracked my brother to. Hiding behind boxes and crates in the stuffy cargo area, I waited for the ship to land. When it did, I found myself in front of a bar named Jill’s where a knife-throwing contest was being held in the side yard.

Taking the knife that Malcolm had given me years before (the same knife I had inherited from my mother before she died) I signed up, thinking there might be a pretty penny involved. There were only five people participating: four men and me. One of the men had a rugged yet handsome look about himself. What I noticed most about him, though, was his knife. I’d always loved knives—if only for the sometimes unique or beautiful design of the handle—and this knife I had to have. The handle was black with an ivory butt, nothing special, of course, but I liked the simplicity of it.

“A gurl can’t throw!” the guy protested, his voice distorted by the cigar in his mouth. He had already beaten the other guys and had won their knives and what money they had thrown in. “Tell you what, you keep the money and I get your knife,” I said, ignoring him.

“If I win, you gots to come with me…”he said, smiling at the crowd, which laughed along with him.

“Okay. May just do that anyway,” I said and winked at him.

He winked back and tossed his knife on the ground in front of my feet. I noticed that the blade wasn’t silver like most knife blades were, but a bluish color. I wanted it even more.

Acting quickly, I took the knife from my belt and threw it at the target, keeping my head turned the other way. Even without the gasp of the crowd to confirm, I knew I had hit the target. The knife was mine. I went to the target and pulled the knife out of the wood.

“How’d you do dat?” he asked, his cigar still causing problems with his speech.

“Practice, I guess…” I said and went to get my prize. I looked back at the money and groaned inwardly. It had been enough to feed me for a few months. Shaking my head, I left the crowd.

“Whoa, there, girl. Take this money, seein’s you earned it an’ all.” The guy stuffed the money in my bag.

“Thanks, but a deal is a deal. Keep the money. I have your knife.”

“Yeah, and you would have had it anyway, you know that. Besides, I liked that throw and I shouldn’t have stuck my foot in my mouth, sayin a girl can throw and all.” The man sounded sincere, so I took the money without another word.

“Where’d you come from?” he asked me. I pointed back at the ship I’d gotten off of, not thinking of any bad consequences that might occur because of my honesty. The man laughed and threw his cigar down, stomping on it.

“That’s my ship, missy. What the hell are you doin, stowin away?” he asked.

“It really is your own fault. You shouldn’t leave you ship unattended for so long. Besides, I guarantee that you aren’t as mad as you’re acting, now are you darlin?” I smiled at him and he rolled his eyes. “Well, you owe me dinner and conversation. Because I’m sure we’re both hungry and there isn’t anything else to do but talk. Deal?” he asked, holding out his hand for me to shake. “Fine by me. You got a deal,” I said, shaking his hand.

“My name’s Jayne, by the way.”

I smiled. “Mine’s Audra. Nice to meet you.”

* * *

“So, what have you been up to?” Mal asked me as we walked to The Colony’s loading dock.

“Besides looking all over the place for you guys? Nothing much. What about you two? Finally get married and have kids?” I teased.

“Married, yes, but not to each other. Mal married Serendipity and I married its pilot, Wash Granette,” she said.

“You mean Wash Harrington?” I asked.

“Nope. No exchanging of last names, just exchanges of body fluid,” she grinned.

“Blood?” I asked, still joking with her.

“Occasionally,” Mal said, smiling down at me.

“Very funny, sir,” she said and rolled her eyes.

We walked further on, Mal telling me what he had gone though to find me. Eventually, he said, he just called the Office of Human Records and asked for my current address, saying he wanted to send me a birthday card.

By the time we reached the huge ship, I was tired of walking and wanting to go back to bed. Zoe laughed at me, saying I had let myself go. Mal raised his eyebrows at me, sweat spotted above them. He was tired, too.

“Alright, here we are,” Mal said as we boarded the ship.

“They’re still gone for supplies and stuff. Come on, lazy bones. I’ll show you your quarters,” Zoe said.

“Wow, little brother. You did well. You actually have a ship big enough to have quarters.” I said, following Zoe up a long flight of stairs to the left of the cargo area.

“That’s right, I do. Hope you find your room to your liking. Take a nap and I’ll introduce you to the crew when you get up,” he said with an amused smirk.

“Is that an order, Captain Jenkins?” I joked.

“Don’t encourage him, Audra,” Zoe sighed from behind me.

My room was bigger that the room I’d had in Murmur’s home. The bed was pushed into the far right-hand corner and seemed as comfortable as it was big. A closet stood a few feet away from the foot of it and was full of my old clothes. A chest of drawers stood beside the bed, with a knife rack hanging on the wall above it. Across the room from the drawers was a big oak desk, covered with writing material, a radio, and my mother’s old jewelry box, filled with her jewelry.

I put the only picture that I had of Jayne on the desk and put my knives on the rack. After I had everything else unpacked, I poured Kitty some food out in her bowl and put the bowl under the bed along with some water that I’d brought along with it. Finally, I let Kitty out of her cage and lay down on the bed to sleep.

* * *

When I woke up, I heard voices coming up from the cargo area. Picking up the cookies and coffee, I went slowly down stairs, balancing my load in front of me.

“Who is she, what does she look like, and does she have a nice rack?” a gruff voice asked.

“If you’re talkin about me, I got a really nice knife rack. And I brought a gift,” I said.

The blond girl took a few running steps toward me and helped me with the cookies. The black man to my left took the coffee.

“Cookies! Oh, I’m Callie, by the way,” the girl said.

“I’m Sheppard Book Lowe. You can call me Book,” the black guy said.

“Audra?” the gruff voiced guy asked in disbelief. I looked over at him and gasped. “Jayne!” I ran over to him and jumped up in his arms and he spun me around.

“God, girl, where have you been?” he asked and kissed me.

“Wait a minute. You two know each other?” Zoe asked.

“Look’s like it, don’t it?” Mal asked with his mouth full of cookie.

“We know each other, as well,” a delicate feminine voice said.

I turned to see Inara Shelly, smiling at me like a long-lost sister. “Looks like you found my brother before I did,” I said and hugged her.

“It does, does it not?” she said, returning the hug.

“Small world, isn’t it folks? Let me make some coffee and we can all become acquainted with Captain Jenkins’s sister,” Book said, going over to the ships small kitchen that lied in the next room.

We all went into the kitchen and sat around a long, rectangular table. Zoe sat near a blond, pale faced guy with big blue eyes. He was her husband, Wash, and they looked entirely opposite from one another. Their difference brought an old saying to mind: opposites attract.

The two other people at the table were brother/sister and named Simon and River Glass. Simon—like Mal—was the older and River—like me—was the younger. But, unlike Mal and me, Simon and River seemed to be scared and out of place. Simon, I learned, was a doctor running away to keep his sister safe from GroingTavelers. Mal had taken them in, unknowing at first, that Simon and River were fugitives. Mal later on, according to Callie, had warmed up to Simon as he respected what he had done for his sister. “Looks like we got more in common than you might think,” I said to River. I had never met anyone else that had been stolen by GroingTavelers until now, and I didn’t know what to expect from her.

“How’s that?” River asked me from within her mask of stringy hair.

I rolled up my sleeve and showed her the tattoo on my arm. My number had been 253 in the GroingTavelers log and records, so the scientists had the number tattooed onto my arm. The same thing was tattooed onto the same place of each “subject’s” wrist in the same color, size, and shape. All that differed was the individual number.

River jerked up her sleeve and slung her hair out of her face. Her number was 254. “What does this mean?” she asked Simon. He shrugged.

“It means that we were branded one after the other. I really don’t know what happened to me at GroingTavelers. I never have found any of that mystery out. I guess I’m too scared to go back to GroingTavelers, the only way to find out anything. Surely a doctor would know this?” I asked Simon.

“It is quite obvious, isn’t it?” he asked, taking a bite of cookie.

River laughed. “He likes you.”

I smiled at Jayne. “Of course he does. What have I done to make him not like me?”

“Okay, enough of this GroingTavelers stuff. How have you been?” Inara asked me.

I told her about my fruitless year of searching for Mal before spending three more with Jayne, still fruitless in my searching. I spoke fondly of the year I’d spent with Murmur and Yolanda on The Colony.

“What caused you to break free of Jayne?” she asked, apparently disliking Jayne.

“He got called off somewhere to do some work and I really didn’t want to go with him, since I thought the work was stupid. I told him I was moving onto The Colony and apparently he hated the idea so he never came to see me when he got back,” I said and squeezed his shoulder softly. “No, that’s not it. I only got back in this part of the galaxy recently and Mal gave me a job. I would have gone to see you if I had any money,” he said.

“My next question: what did, do, rather, you see in Jayne?” Inara asked.

“Lot’s of stuff. Hey, did you hear about what happened to Jeralla?” I asked, knowing the two had been as close to friends as two companions could get. Jeralla had come into a lot of money in the past few years. Her “house” was the most prominent in the entire existence of “houses” and Jeralla had become famous. “Yeah. She’s one lucky girl. Speaking of whom, your brother is highly involved in another legend-making journey. This one: to help Jeralla out with some of her problems.

I looked at Malcolm. “Thought you disapproved of companions and the like, little brother,” I said, confusion settling in my insides.

“She needs help. She called Inara and I agreed that we could do what she needs. You can help, too. Especially since you have experience with these people,” he smirked again.

The look Inara gave me was of pure guilt. She had told Mal about my former job as her bodyguard and all the not-so-legend-making adventures I’d had because of it.

“Well, yeah. You’d need me, wouldn’t you?” I asked, taking a sip of coffee. From his seat at the end of the table, I noticed Book hadn’t stopped looking at me. The way he looked at me gave me the impression that he knew me from somewhere. I couldn’t place where, if anywhere, I’d seen his face but I had a feeling that he may have known me at some point in time. “There’s no way that I can know everyone on my brother’s ship,” I said, looking at Book.

“Well, you don’t know Simon, River, or Wash. You may not remember me either. But you are the reason I turned from the cloth,” he said.

My frown said a thousand words, all of utter confusion and intolerable agitation. Now I knew I’d seen his face before. Not that I knew him personally, but I had definitely seen him, somewhere or another.

“Come, child. You must remember the battle fought at Durlington. You were the only one left standing and refused to say prayers over the heathen’s bodies. Instead, you helped those in need of medicine and water and what not. Why waste time on praying to people who had lost faith even in themselves. All they needed was human compassion. I agreed with you and, thus, left my preaching to the minions of believers behind to preach the gospel to those without it.” “Oh, yeah, I DO remember you. You threw your bible aside to help the children who’d lost their parents. What has become of you?” I asked, winking at him.

“The little children needed me for much more than telling them bible stories. I found greater fulfillment in helping others with their problems than telling them to do things that came from a book written by a god who had forgotten them long ago.”

“Hmm. But, why are you here on Serendipity?” I asked.

“Let’s just say I’m running away from those who didn’t want me to stop preaching. Let’s leave it at that and eat some more of these cookies.” Malcolm cleared his throat. “Way to go, little sister. You have made the man say more to you about his past than I could and you’ve only been here a few hours.”

“What can I say, little brother? I’m a charmer,” I said and kissed Jayne. I got up to get some more coffee.

“What I don’t get is why you call him “little brother.” Aren’t you younger than him?” Wash asked.

“He speaks,” I winked at Zoe as I sat back down. “Only when I want to,” Wash winked at Zoe, making her smile.

“Well, when we were kids, he called me “little sister” because he knew it got on my nerves. I started calling him “little brother” and it stuck. Called him that ever since. So, what are we doing to help Jeralla? Can’t think of what kind of trouble she can’t get out of by herself,” I said.

Inara told me of Jeralla’s problem with her “house” and the man that wanted to take over. Apparently, the man, Lester Sigmunds, was a very powerful person in the small town of Kobi, on the nearby planet of Neuebla. Without a little help, nothing Jeralla could do would help her keep her house and girls. Jeralla’s house was the most profitable in the entire universe, and that meant it made a great amount of money. Mal had been promised to help for the thin price of 100,000 dollars, half of what I had made working for Inara but enough to make my brother happy.

“Besides, I’ve always had a soft spot for people in trouble,” Malcolm said.

“And the fact that Jeralla has promised us some service once the job is done,” Simon said.

“You’re staying on the ship,” I told Jayne, seriously. Even though I knew Jayne wouldn’t take whatever services Jeralla and her girls offered, I knew that Jayne had a tendency to get drunk at times and places like this. He also had a tendency to embarrass himself as well as me.

“You staying with me?” he asked, eyebrows raised up.

“No, neither of you are staying. We need all the help we can possibly get. Can you still shoot?” Zoe asked me.

“Yeah. Don’t have a piece, though,” I said.

“You can have one of mine. Come by my room after while and pick you one out. Wait, all I got is one,” Jayne said, mocking my wink.

I laughed. “Can I see him?”

“Later.”

“Not such a good idea, Jayne. You two might want to stay away from each other. Audra can have a few of my guns,” Malcolm warned us.

At that time, River shot up out of her chair and raced to the cargo area. She picked up Kitty and help her to her face, smiling. Simon looked at Malcolm and swallowed hard.

“Where did that thing come from?” Mal asked me in a hushed voice.

“Well, I couldn’t just leave it behind, now could I?” I asked, making my voice soft as well. “Look, Simon! A kitten,” River said.

Inara and Callie went over to River and they both began to talk to the cat. I looked at Inara and motioned for her to give the kitten to Mal. She did and the kitten butted heads with him and, when he began to stroke its fur, I knew that Kitty would get to stay.

“What’s her name?” River asked.

“Kitty,” I said.

“Typical of you to be so original,” Mal commented, rolling his eyes at me.

“Can we keep it?” River asked.

“Yeah, just make sure you clean up after it. And keep her out of my room.”

* * *

I helped Callie clean up the cookie and coffee dishes and we talked about the kitten. The talk changed as soon as everyone had gone.

“Ya know they didn’t tell you everything about Jeralla’s problem?” she asked.

“That’s typical of my brother and Inara, but no. I had no idea. What’s up?” I asked.

“Well, we are going to help Jeralla with that guy and all, you know, but there’s a whole lot more. Apparently Zoe and Mal don’t think I know, and they don’t want the others to know either, but I overheard them when I was fixin the hole in the engine’s bottom,” she said.

“Is it bad or is it exciting?” I asked.

“A little of both, I guess. You see, the thing is, there’s been a ship of Jreniliba outcasts detected on the radar. If they don’t turn course, we could run right smack into ‘em.”

“My brother must really think these girls need his help to chance meeting a ship full of Reevers,” I said, stopping in the middle of a dish to think about what was happening.

“Yeah. Really. What I don’t get is why he won’t tell the rest of us,” Callie said.

“Jayne, and probably the rest of the crew, is terrified of ‘em. Isn’t there a way around them?” I asked.

“That’s what I heard Mal ask Wash. You two think alike. Anyway, Wash said that you could go around them but that they would still detect us and that could lead us to being followed and the Reevers coming down to Kobi. Malcolm said he needed to help these people. He won’t back down cuz he’s too darn relentless,” she said. “I know. He’s always been that way. Here’s hoping they go the other way,” I said, raising a glass full of dishwater up to toast. She laughed and clicked her own glass of dishwater to mine.

After Callie and I had finished washing dishes, she went up to her room. I dried the dishes alone, stacking them into the cabinet one at a time, thinking about many different things all at the same time. Mal came over and helped me finish stacking, watching my face as I worked. Did he notice something about me that he though suspicious or was he just generally concerned? By the time we were finished, he was beginning to make me nervous.

“Audra, what’s wrong?” he asked, taking me by the shoulders.

“There’s something about this whole thing you aren’t telling me, isn’t there? I can sense it in the way you keep looking at me. You’re making me nervous.”

“Sorry. I don’t mean to. And you’re right. There’s something about this whole mess that I’m not telling you. I don’t think I should, as it would warrant what may be unnecessary worry,” he said.

“But what if it isn’t unnecessary? What if I need to worry?” I asked.

“YOU have never needed to worry. You’re too prone to headaches, bad dreams, and violent nose bleeds. There is nothing to this that I can’t handle, should handling become necessary. Leave it to me and enjoy the ride to go see your old friend Jeralla. Me and my crew are competent enough, thank-you very kindly,” he said with a classic Malcolm Jenkins wink.

With that said, Mal left to go to his room and I went to mine. Thinking better of it, I went to find Jayne. There seemed to be many things that I wanted to tell him and so little time in which to do it. I found him sitting at a table in his room, cleaning his favorite gun, which he’d named Vera. I put my arms around his shoulders and he put the gun down, leaning back against me. There was no need for words at that moment.

All either of us needed was the assurance that the other was there. Jayne stood and bent slightly down to kiss me as he closed the door to his room. Right at that moment, I knew that I didn’t want to be anywhere else or with anyone else. All that mattered to me and to my life was aboard Serendipity.

* * *

“You know what?” Jayne asked a few hours later.

I rolled over onto my side and put my head on his shoulder next to his. “What?”

“This is the second best day of my life.”

“Why’s that?”

“Because, today I found out that you’re alright. I got you back.”

“You never lost me. I have always been there, even if only in your dreams and thoughts, you know.”

He laughed. “Yeah, I know. But my dreams drive me nuts and my thoughts make me mad. I never knew where you were or how you were doin’. I didn’t know if you were alright or not, if you had found somebody else or whatever, you know. Easy for you to know that there’s nobody else for me, but you’re different. You deserve better.”

“I disagree with you there, Jayne. Name me someone who’s better than you?”

“Somebody that’s nicer and smarter than me. I know I ain’t the brightest of people, you know,” he said, putting his mouth to my forehead. “I don’t care if you are or not. I love you just the way you are, bad manners and all. Who wants to be clean and shiny all the time? You’re different. I missed you, too. And I know what you mean about dreams and thoughts making you go nuts. It happens to me all the time. But it was all I had to hold onto when you weren’t there. This is me and this is how I feel. Not even you or me can change it.”

“Not that I’d want to. I just want you to have what’s best for you. I want you to be happy.” “I am. Trust me. I’d be unhappy if anything changed, so you better not do something really mean and stupid and leave me.” I looked up at his face, seeing that he had softened by one-hundred percent.

“Like I said, I ain’t that bright. But I ain’t that stupid, either. You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me and I’ll kill whoever tries to take you away from me. If it were up to me, I’d have you here with me forever.”

“It is up to you, Jayne. I wish we could stay like this forever,” I said, laying my head back down and closing my eyes.

Jayne covered both of us up to the chin, telling me that his room wasn’t good about keeping heat. I held onto his sides and put my face back beside his. Sleep slowly crept beneath the covers, overwhelming my senses to an overwhelming halt. Dreams didn’t come at first, just after thoughts of things that Jayne had said, multiplied by ten, bringing along images to accompany the words. Suddenly, a comfortable feeling of warmth was taken over by an intense heat. This time the dream didn’t take as long, but it held more detail than the others ever had. Again, I was lying on a sweaty mattress, covered by nothing but my clothes and the needle was lowering over my eye. It was finally inserted in the center of my pupil and a green liquid was released inside. My eyeball filled with this liquid only to be emptied minutes later through my skull and then into my brain. Even though there was no way of knowing this, still I knew it to be a fact. My brain was still undergoing some sort of cleansing.

In the dream, I felt nauseated and my head began to pound under the pressure of the liquid being poured within. The liquid was drained from my brain through a tube in the back of my head and I was left alone: cold, scared, and in pain greater than any I’d felt since.

I shot up off the bed and looked around the cold room. The blanket was bunched at the bottom of the bed and Jayne slept peacefully. My nose began to bleed and I hang my legs off the side of the bed, holding my shirt to it to make it stop. A severe chill ran up my body, making me shake visibly as I tried to stop my nosebleed. Even though it hadn’t started yet, I could feel the ghost of a killer headache coming my way. “Audra, are you okay?” Jayne asked, sitting behind me, holding my head.

My nose had stopped bleeding and my headache had already reached its claws into outer the skin of my brain. I nodded and cleaned what I could from my face. Jayne, who could see my face better, took the shirt from me and cleaned the rest of the blood away.

“Yeah. I just had another dream. No big deal.” “You’re covered with blood and you say no big deal. Just like you, darlin’,” he said with sarcasm.

“Learned from the best.”

Jayne smiled at this and gathered me into his arms. “You’re cold. That must have been one helluva dream.” He covered me up and handed me one of his clean shirts from his table. I put it on and rested against his chest. My headache was getting worse with each passing second and I knew I would need some support of some kind when the tidal wave hit full force. Jayne, who’d experienced what happened when I had my dreams, knew all about my headaches and he knew what he’d have to do. He helped me get comfortable and put his arms around me tighter. I didn’t know if I would scream this time or if I would cry. Jayne seemed to be prepared for either or for both.

The pain came in even flows, bashing against the insides of my skull like water hitting a beach. With each wave, the pain intensified where, finally, I was like a lost child. I tried to hold back my cries, but finally the tears began to flow, easing the pain enough so that I was no longer paralyzed. Jayne’s hold on me didn’t let up and his words of optimism were relentless. Finally, the headache was over and I could move again without my head threatening to explode. Jayne still held me, and I let him. I was still to weak to say anything and didn’t want to go to sleep.

Eventually I looked up at Jayne and smiled. “See there, no big deal.”

“Very funny. Are you really okay?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

“Didn’t the same thing happen to River? How come she doesn’t have these headaches and nosebleeds?” he asked angrily.

I hugged him around the waist and lay my head on his stomach. “She’s younger than me. You still believe that there’s anyone better for me than you are. Who else would put up with my headaches?” I laughed.

“I hate your damn headaches and I wish I could do something to get rid of them,” he said, defiantly.

“Same here, baby. I wish I never had them to begin with. Still, glad you’re here.”

“Don’t thank me for that, darlin. I love you and I don’t want anyone else to be here besides me. I’m the only one who knows what to do.”

I smiled. “I love you, too, Jayne.

* * *

The next time that I woke up, Jayne was gone and the ship had landed. I walked over to my room to get some clean clothes and then went take a shower. It seemed like everyone had already gotten up and gone somewhere.

After I dressed, I grabbed a knife from the rack in my room and put it in my belt. No matter what, I always carried a blade with me. One could never be sure that something requiring my expertise wouldn’t come up.

I fed the kitten and closed the door to my room, keeping the kitten inside until I could come back. Walking down the stairs to the cargo area, I put my hair up into a ponytail. Best bet: always be prepared to fight. Something in the air told me to expect the worse, so I did. I expected the worse, and then some more.

When I got outside, the first thing I saw was a quaint, not-to-big house with a garden to the side of it and a long clothesline at the back of it. The next thing that I noticed was that the house was surrounded by desert land, as far as the eye could see. A girl came out and stood just beyond the doorway, looking directly at the ship and then at me. I could tell by how her red hair seemed to catch fire by the light of the sun that it was my old “job,” Jeralla.

“Hey, Audra. How are you?” she asked, coming over to me.

“Just fine. And you?” I asked her.

“As well as can be expected. Glad you are here.”

“Glad to be here.”

Jeralla and I walked inside her “house” and suddenly I was hit by a burst of cool air. I stood under the air condition vent for a few seconds, cooling the sweat from my forehead. The walk from the ship to the house, though a short one, had been very warm.

“Took the girls forever to earn enough money in the old days to have that installed,” Jeralla said, smiling at me. Her forehead was as dry as if she hadn’t even gone outside.

The room that I stood in was big. There was a C of scarlet sofas directly ahead of me, circling a heart-shaped, wooden table. In the center of this table stood a fat, green vase, filled with red roses. Over the table hang a chandelier with rose read crystals of different sizes hanging sporadically about in a beautiful way. There was a small bar behind the back couch, made of the same redwood that the table was made of. Bottles of different types of wine and liquor sat on an immaculate shelf behind the bar.

A circular sofa sat to the left of the room, under a picture window overlooking the garden. This sofa was much plusher but still the same color of scarlet as the others. In front of this sofa sat a rose-colored glass table with different types of cigars and other tobacco products strewn fashionably about. Next to the bar, on the left, behind the circular sofa, was small set of steps, leading up into what appeared to be a hallway.

On the right of the room, to the right of the bar, was a long set of stairs that led up the wall, hooking to the right. These stairs led up to an overlook that lead to two different rooms. Under this overlook was a table, covered with every type of food I could ever want to eat.

“Not too shabby, Jer,” I said, nodding my approval.

“I knew you’d like it. Inara didn’t seem too impressed.”

“This means that either she’s jealous or she really likes it. She’s always been like that,” I said, patting her on the back. “I hope she’s not jealous.” Jeralla led me through the door to the left of the bar. She ordered a banana daiquiri for me, saying I could come back in a few minutes to pick it up. We went down a long hall that had a dead end. Turning to the right, we went up a very long set of stairs. At the top of these stairs sat three doors, one straight ahead and one on either side. Jeralla opened the door directly in front of the stairs and motioned for me to follow her. Lying on the bed lay Francis Dwayne, a girl I’d met while working as Jeralla’s bodyguard. She was in the process of having a baby.

Simon was on his knees in front of her, looking completely clueless. I looked at Jeralla and she nodded. She wanted me to help Simon deliver the baby.

“Do me a favor and watch the big tall guy with the goatee that came with us,” I said, walking over to Francis.

“Oh, you mean Jayne, the guy that keeps talking about you to my girls,” Jeralla said, smiling. “Let’s hope he stays that way.”

Jeralla closed the door behind her and I sat next to Francis on the bed. “Remember me?”

She began to laugh. “You’re here to help us? Thank the goddess,” she said in elation masked with the pain of her labor.

“Right now I’m here to help you. Don’t worry about anything else but having this baby, okay? Everything is gonna be okay,” I said and wiped the sweat from her brow with a nearby washcloth.

“I know everything will be okay now that you’re here,” she smiled.

I walked down to the foot of the bed and told Simon to take a break and that a banana daiquiri was waiting for him at the bar. He only sighed in relief and left without a word, quietly closing the door behind him. I locked the door and went back to the bed, clearing my mind. “It’s gonna be okay, Franny. Don’t worry about a thing. I got rid of the man,” I said.

She laughed and I checked the progress under the sheets. The birth had just started and it would be a while before this new life would be in the world. “Good thing I decided to get up when I did. So, you got any names?” I asked her.

“If it’s a boy, it’s gonna be Jonah. If I have a girl, it’s gonna be Merina,” she said before screaming in pain.

Six hours later, she gave birth to a little boy, Jonah. I cleaned the baby up and, when I was sure all was okay, I wrapped it in a clean, soft towel and handed it to Francis. She smiled and tears of relief ran down her cheeks. I got up off the bed and unlocked the door. Eight girls came in, squeezing through the door to get a look at this new, screaming bundle of life.

“It’s a big baby,” I told Jeralla as I passed her.

“You’re used to it, remember? When are you gonna have one?” she asked.

“Never, if I can help it,” I said.

“You sure about that, Audra? You don’t want one of these?” Francis asked as I reached the door.

I smiled at the new family and sighed inwardly. “Maybe one day.”

Leaving the girls to talk to Francis and look over the baby, I went to find my brother.

Instead, I found Jayne talking to one of the girls at the circular sofa. His face was animated and his voice was loud. The girl he was talking to looked bored to death.

“You know, I gave her a knife and she still gots it,” he said.

“Good for her, good for you,” the girl said, yawning.

“Yeah, really. Another thing that she has that I did is a really good bow and arrow. She’s probably lost all the arrows by now, though…” he said, his voice fading as he thought. “Lost them a long time ago, darlin. What have you been up to the last few hours?” I asked, putting my arms around his shoulders.

“Waitin’ for you. The last time I saw you, you were sleepin’,” he said, grinning at me with all of his teeth.

“Sorry to keep you waiting. You seen my brother?” I asked, kissing his forehead. He looked up at the over-hang. Mal looked down at me with a vicious frown on his face. His jaw was set and his eyes bore into mine.

“What the hell’s wrong with you?” I asked, loud enough for him to hear me.

He jumped the over-hang and landed on the floor a few yards away from me.

“Where the hell were you?” he hissed, grabbing my arm.

“What’s it to you?” I asked, breaking free of his grasp.

“Who do you think you are, going off like that and NOT telling me where you’re going? I looked all over the place for you,” he hissed.

“You are the one who left me on the ship this morning. When I got here, I didn’t see any of you, save for Simon. Jeralla asked me to help him, so I did. I help those that I can, little brother,” I said.

“Don’t talk to me like that, or I’ll be forced to remove you and your belongings from my ship. No, I’ll do worse than that, I won’t even let you leave your room,” he said and bore his fingers into my wrist.

I shoved him away, his hold hurting my arm. He reached back and slapped me, knocking me backwards a few feet. As he turned to leave, I jumped on his back and brought him to the ground, using all my weight to keep him there.

My fist met his nose before I could think about what I was doing. He hit me with a fist of his own, snapping my head back nearly hard enough to break my neck. I got off of him and kicked him in the side and he grabbed my ankle, causing me to trip and hit my head. He picked me up by the shirt and pulled me up over him. My head butted his, causing me more pain than any hit he’d given me. Mal staggered backwards, falling onto his back. I jumped on him, pinning his arms to the ground.

Looking around, I noticed that all was quiet. Even Mal’s crewmembers appeared shocked. Jayne and Zoe were the only ones who remained calm with Zoe waiting patiently for the fight to end and Jayne sharpening his knife. Mal looked up at me, his face still in a frown. I smiled at him, tickling him on the sides. He began to laugh and so did I.

“And they’re gonna save us all,” Jeralla said, stepping over Mal’s legs to go out the front door.

“Hope you two got that out of your system. We got trouble,” Zoe said.

“What sort of “trouble”?” Mal asked, picking his head up off the floor to look at Zoe. “Starts with an R and we thought we avoided them this morning. Wash said they found our ship and they’ll be here in a few days. Looks like they’re coming fast, like they’re angry.” I stood up and dusted the dirt on my pants off. “When aren’t they mad?”

“You know what we’re talking about?” Mal asked. “Come on, Mal. Give me some credit. Starts with an R? I’m sure everyone here knows what you’re talking about.” I didn’t want Mal to know that Callie had told me, so I gave the obvious explanation.

“Well, according to Jeralla, Sigmunds won’t strike until his boys get here the day after tomorrow. We’ll handle him, get off this planet, and get them away from here. It shouldn’t be so hard,” Mal said.

“No offence, Mal, but Serendipity isn’t fast enough to outrun a Reever motor-ship,” I said, sitting by Jayne on the sofa. “It may not look like much, true. Wash, Callie, and Serendipity, though, make an excellent team,” Mal said and called Wash and Callie to the room.

Mal told them the situation with the Reevers, even though Wash already knew what was going on, to ask them if they could handle getting out of there, “on a dime.” They looked at each other, paling. Mal took this as a “no.” He sat on the back of the couch, didn’t say a word, and didn’t move.

“Not to worry, Mal. I believe these guys can handle anything you can throw at them. I have faith in their abilities,” I said, putting my head on Jayne’s shoulder.

“Why aren’t you scared, either of you?” Simon asked Jayne and me as he came in from the front door. He had been spying on us from outside. “I thought you hated Reevers.”

“Oh, I do. Don’t get me wrong. They scare the shit out of me. But when Audra here says that Serendipity can’t outrun a Reever motor-ship and, in the same breath, says she has faith in Callie and Wash’s abilities, I tend not to worry.”

“What’s your plan?” Mal asked me, turning his head around to face me.

“You’ll see. Watch me work, little brother. You leave it to me and go get ready for your shootout. I can handle this baby stuff. All I need to know is if Callie can pilot and if either can pilot a Magnum?” I asked, looking at Wash.

“No problem,” he said.

“Yeah, I can pilot a little. Wash has been teachin’ me,” Callie assured me.

“Good. Because I have a fellow that lives on this planet who owes me a big-ass favor for saving his butt a few years ago. I don’t think he lives too far from here,” I said, standing up and walking towards the door.

“Who?” Mal asked.

“Man by the name of Grease. Real name Jeffery Hanson.”

“Holy shit! You know Grease?” Wash asked.

“Who’s that?” Zoe asked.

“Oh, just a guy who taught me to fly. Come on, Wash and Callie, I can call him from Serendipity,” I said.

Wash, Callie and I went to the ship and to the pilot room. Wash fired up the com for me and I dialed in Grease’s coordinates. I sent out a distress signal and coded in my name. Seconds later, a message flashed across the screen that said he was on his way, ETA: 9:00 p.m. He’d been there in less than an hour.

“You sure you two can fly a Magnum?” I asked. “It’s been a while, but yeah. You think Grease will let us fly it?” Wash asked.

“Well, all I need him for is getting the ship here. It’s mine to begin with. I just haven’t flown in forever. It’s a cute little ship. It’ll outrun a motor-ship in no time flat. The problem is getting them to leave us alone. We get rid of them and we can come back and get them. Mal will probably disagree with me, but it’ll just be you two out there. When it’s over, you can come back and get the rest of us, swap ships and get back on Serendipity. He’ll want to be out there. You guys have any ideas?” I asked.

“Well, Mal is too hard headed to change his mind, and he is our captain. Maybe you could beat some sense into him,” Callie said, smiling.

“You saw that, huh? Well, we’ve been beating on each other since we were little, and I do believe that any sense either of us could have got beat out of us a long time ago. Mal can fly, though, so he’ll want to be up there instead of you. I believe that Wash is an excellent pilot and you need to be up here with him, you’ll listen to Wash better than Mal will, you know. Anyway, Mal needs to be down here with Zoe and Jayne to fight off Sigmunds. He may be more than they can handle. That’s why I’m not flying with Wash. I’m better in battle than getting away from one, you know what I mean?”

“Audra’s right. Callie needs to be up there with you, Wash. I’m better at battle than at piloting away from something like the Reevers,” Mal said, stepping into the pilot room.

“You gonna let her go?” I asked him. Mal shook his head, glaring at me through puffy eyes. The eye I’d hit him in was swollen nearly shut and was already blackened.

* * *

The four of us went back to the house, Wash locking the doors on the ship this time. Simon and Jayne were going over possible scenarios for the up-coming battle, arguing and not getting anything done. Simon had some good-sounding ideas and Jayne didn’t want to hear him. I had to intervene before Simon looked like Mal’s eye did, except all over his body.

“Whatcha’ got, Simon?” I asked, sitting in Jayne’s lap.

“Bunch of crap, that’s what,” Jayne muttered. I squeezed Jayne’s chin with one hand. “How many have you had?”

“Can’t remember,” he said.

I told him to go to bed so that he would be well rested the next day. He argued a few seconds until I asked one of the girls to take him to a room. I asked her to give a back rub, that I’d be up to check on him later. He quietened nearly instantly and followed the girl up the stairs, past the over-hang, and into the first room. Simon rolled his eyes at Jayne and gave me a strange frown.

“You’re ideas sound great. Show them to Mal later, he’ll appreciate your help. Looks like you’ve done this for him before,” I said.

“Yeah. A few times. Looks like I’d learn to stay away from Jayne,” Simon said.

“I know what you mean. Jayne’s more of a fighter instead of a tactics expert. Don’t expect him to come up with any ideas. He’s excellent at following plans, though. More of a solitary fighter, as far as tactics goes. That’s not what I want to talk to you about, though. I’ve had to talk to you since I met you yesterday.”

“About what?” he frowned.

“River and GroingTavelers, and what information you have.”

“Well, I doubt I know more than you do. How long have you been out?” he asked.

“About 18 years. How old is River?” I asked. “18 years? Wow, how old are you? River’s 16.” “Nearly 30, scary as that may sound. How long has she been out?” I asked.

“Less than half a year. They got her when she was 13. Apparently, she has a powerful mind and the ability to use it. They did tests on her for a while, trying to extract that genius, for reasons I don’t know. I don’t really think that they can do that. I know very little about what they did to her and why or how they did it. All I have is tried theory. Theory is nothing without proof,” he said.

“You may be right. They were using her for her genius, not to extract it but to use it through her. She’s physic, isn’t she? And the fact that she was so smart to begin with made her a perfect specimen. I wasn’t as smart as she is; I just had a tendency to get in and out of messes easily. I was out in the woods one afternoon, playing in the caves. They were there, waiting for me. I don’t know what they wanted me for, but I was taken away from my family. Mal got me out of the institute, as they called it, when I was 12. I had been there for two years. Enough time to do some serious damage to my sleep,” I said.

“You must have something visible that they wanted,” he said, leaning forward, his voice low enough for only me to hear it.

I sat closer to him. “I may be wrong, but this is the only thing I’ve noticed. My brother is like this too. You see, I have a sixth sense when it comes to fighting or learning tactical things that come with fighting. Only, I’m much keener than Mal. He has it from experience, mostly. I’ve had it since before I was taken. I used to get into scuffles with the older, bigger kids and I always came out on top. As I said, I don’t know if this is it or not. All I know is that I’ve beaten things much bigger and smarter than I am,” I said, watching his face to see if he thought I was crazy.

“Maybe. You’d know better than I would. And you know what River’s going though better than I do. She has bad dreams, muscle aches, fevers, and other things that I know are connected to this that happened to her at GroingTavelers. As you said before, the only way to find out how to help her is to go back there. It’s harder to do than it was when you were there. The Earth government owns the place now, and the place is well guarded,” he said hopelessly.

I patted his shoulder. “Don’t worry, Simon. River has you, and that’s the best thing she could have now. I don’t know what I would have done without Zoe and Mal when I was a kid. You knowing about medicine is a plus that I didn’t have. She’ll need something from time to time to kill the pain caused by her fevers and headaches, as I’m sure you already know. You’ll find out a way to help her sometime in the future, don’t worry about that.”

“I just hate for her to have to have those pains and bad dreams, though. I’m her big brother. There should be something that I can do for her to help her,” he said, his eyes glassing over with tears.

“Where there’s a will, there’s a way. I’ll help you whichever way I can,” I said.

He smiled and wiped at his eyes. “Sorry I’m such a baby. Your help will be appreciated very much. Thank you.”

“Not a baby at all, Doc. I’d say you were one of a kind, but then I’d remember my brother,” I said, smiling.

* * *

Simon got up off the sofa and went to show Mal his plans. I went to check on my patient. When I got there, Francis was sleeping and Inara was holding the baby. She was singing him a song, “Take Me to My Dream.” She sounded good for someone who didn’t sing all that often, having been trained as a singer at Q-Jaus. “Bravo!” I said in a whisper, seeing that she had sang both mother and baby to sleep. She looked over at me and smiled.

“These girls are so lucky,” she whispered, putting the little boy in his crib.

“Now, what’s that supposed to mean? Inara Shelly wants a baby?” I asked.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” she said and walked over to the window farthest from the bed. I followed her.

“Same thing that’s always been wrong with you, kiddo. Holding things in gets you thinking things that you don’t mean or things that you don’t want to do. You dwell on them for too long and they become permanently attached to your heart and soul. I know, cuz I’m the same way.” “Not entirely, you aren’t. You have Jayne,” she said.

I laughed. “You want him?”

She smiled. “Well, not Jayne completely. Just what he thinks about you and how he talks about you and stands up for you. He’s the type of person to sell anyone out for a cost. He’d never sell you out. He loves you and you him, no matter how rude and barbaric he is. You have someone. I’ve never envied you before now. I guess there’s a time and a place for everything.” “Cheer up, Inara. Plenty of guys would die to have you, and you know it. That’s why you kept me as your bodyguard for so long.”

She sighed. “Yeah. They’d die to have me in their bed, and that’s it. They wouldn’t save my life or hold me when I’m sick or sad.”

“How do you know, your majesty? Have you met every man? Surely not even the great Inara Shelly has done that. Believe me, though. Sometimes I wish I were you. You can’t have your heart broken if you have no one holding it. Not a day goes by that I’m scared to losing him. I nearly did, once. Missing someone is very painful if you don’t know where they are or who they’re with.”

“How long does that pain last? Until you have him back?” she asked, turning to look out the window.

“Sometimes. But who’s to say that that sometime won’t turn out to be permanent?” I asked. “At least you had him to love you in the first place. You’re right, though. I haven’t met every man. But I’ve always known what I wanted and I always get it. I won’t stop until I have him.”

She was looking down at the front of the house where Simon and Mal stood talking over Simon’s plans.

“Some things are gonna be hard for even you to get, Inara. Good luck,” I said, knowing she had a thing for Mal.

“It’s not working so far.”

I turned, smiling at her persistence in attaining the attention of my brother. Not many women could have him, no matter how much they wanted him. The girls he chose, he loved fast so he wouldn’t become too attached. Zoe hadn’t been kidding when she said he’d married his ship. The ship would never leave him. But, if any girl could get to him, Inara could do it. She, as she said, always got what she wanted.

When I got to the room where Jayne was, he was there alone, sleeping. The window was open and he lay on the bed with his shirt off and his shoes on, the same way he’d entered the room only minutes before. I looked at the clock on the wall and noticed it was five minutes until Grease arrived. He was never late and never early. He would be there at 9:00 on the dot.

“You sleepin?” I asked, lying beside Jayne. When he didn’t say anything, I knew that he was.

The girl had done a good job getting him to go to sleep. Putting my head on his back, I listened for Grease to arrive. I hoped that he brought the Magnum, so I wouldn’t have to go out and get it with him. Not that I had anything against Grease; my problem was entirely different. Grease hadn’t only taught me to fly, we’d be dating during the time I had been watching Mal and Zoe’s gun shop. We broke up, but I knew he still had feelings for me. I hoped that Jayne stayed asleep, as I knew he’d take my relationship with Grease the wrong way. Minutes later, I heard someone fly in and land just outside the window. Standing up and walking over to the window, I noticed that Grease had arrived. He had flown in on the Magnum.

By the time I got down stairs, he was already out of the ship and walking towards the house. When he saw me, he shrugged widely, as if he had guessed that I may have wanted him to fly in with the Magnum and may or may not have gotten it right.

“Who told you I needed the Mag?” I asked.

“Lucky guess. What else do I have that you want?” he asked.

“Nothing I can think of at the moment. Took you long enough to get here,” I said, feigning impatience.

“Oh, well. Had to stop by and get a drink or two before coming to your rescue. Every time you get into trouble, I leave the battlefield with a sour stomach.”

I led him inside where Mal, Wash, Zoe, and Callie waited on the circular sofa, talking about the shoot-out. After introducing Grease to the others, I told him of my situation. He didn’t like it that I wasn’t going to fly the Mag and that he wouldn’t get to, either.

“Well, Grease, you only owe me one favor. You don’t owe me your life’s blood,” I said, sitting on the back of the nearest couch.

“The hell you say. Come on, don’t let my flying the Mag over here be the favor I owe you. You saved my life, remember?” he asked, pushing his fingers through his namesake, greasy hair. “Well, you want to help save your planet? You ever heard of Sigmund?” I asked.

“Yeah. I just hope I never have to meet him,” he said.

Mal stood up and explained the situation with Sigmund trying to take over Jeralla’s house and profits. Grease listened intently, eyebrows rising when he heard the part about my working for Jeralla and Inara in the past. I quickly told him I’d only been their bodyguard and Mal continued, telling Grease his plan.

“So, the shoot-out is the day after tomorrow.

Why not use a CR7 and toast ‘em?” Grease asked.

“Because we want the house and its inhabitants to be whole when the shootin stops, that’s why,” I said when Mal gave me his “can we really” look.

Grease said that he would help Mal with Sigmunds and went to find Jeralla to sign him up with a girl for the night. By the look on his face, I knew he had said this aloud to try and make me jealous. He sat at the bar and ordered a drink, waiting for Jeralla to come to him. It appeared that Grease frequented Jeralla’s house. When I noticed Zoe looking at me, I turned to go outside before she, or worse, Grease, could ask me what was wrong. I needed to go for a ride.

Grease had left the keycard partially in the slot of the pilot box of the Mag, just as he always did. Inserting the keycard and setting up the switches the way I wanted them to be, I got ready to go around the open dessert. I knew I couldn’t leave the planet’s atmosphere; something might spot me and come in for the kill. I hadn’t flown in such a long time that a fight with a ship would be a very bad thing for me to get into.

The Mag lifted gently off the ground and hovered at 20 feet. I raised it another 10 feet and took her for a spin. My thoughts wavered between Grease, Jayne, River, and all of the other things I didn’t have time to think of. By the time I snapped back to the present, I was flying at 230 mph. and was nearly out of the planet’s atmosphere. It was time to go back to the house. Checking the fuel gage (it was half-full, since Mags didn’t burn gas too badly), I stood up to stretch my legs. In the reflection in the glass window in front of me, I noticed someone standing behind me, dressed entirely in dark colors. Even the person’s skin was unnaturally dark. The person had blue gloves. I recognized this person to be similar to the person who had stolen me as a child.

“Where is River?” he asked, his (or her?) voice calm and mild.

“I don’t know who you’re talking about. River… never heard the name before in my life.” I said this as I slowly reached for my knife.

“You lie. And you aren’t very good at it. Just tell me where she is and I won’t harm you or your friends,” the “it” said. The voice now sounded snake-like.

“Oh, really? And how can I believe you?” I asked. “Do you have any other choice?” it asked, coming closer.

It put its hands on my shoulders and I turned quickly, stabbing it in the neck. The thing, whatever it was, exploded. The explosion was as if I had stabbed my knife into a balloon. The clothes fell to the ground and a green, smoky substance steamed up from the pile of clothes. Lying beside the clothes were one of the blue gloves. A small, round disk was stuck inside it.

“No, I guess I don’t have any choices, now. Neither do you,” I told the pile of clothes, bending to pick up the disk.

* * *

I put the clothes in the incinerator and burnt them before going back to the house. It was now a few minutes past midnight and most people had already gone to bed. Most of our crew had gone back to the ship to sleep in their own beds. Mal and Jayne waited on the sofa for me. They were the only people in the front room and the only people awake. Mal held Kitty in his lap, stroking her black and white fur.

“You disappeared again,” Jayne said.

“Sorry. This time you both can kick my ass,” I said, sitting across from them.

“I may do just that. And I won’t let you win this time, either. Where did you go?” Mal asked.

“For a ride. I wasn’t gone as long as I was this morning, was I?” I asked, hoping they’d say no.

“No, you were gone half that time. I’m still ticked-off at that stunt you pulled this morning. I let that slide once Simon told me that he didn’t have the stomach to deliver a baby and you had to take over. What’s your excuse this time?” he asked.

“Hell, Mal, what did I do to end up in this jail? Did I do something wrong?” I asked.

Mal rolled his eyes. I really had no idea of why he was being so protective. I figured he wouldn’t let me hang around Jayne, but he didn’t seem to mind about that at all. Even after he had rescued me from GroingTavelers he hadn’t been this protective. Jayne still had a mad look on his face, confusing me even further. These two didn’t have the same reason to be so protective of me, did they?

Mal got up and handed the kitten to me on his way outside. I looked after him but didn’t follow. Right now I would handle Jayne. My brother would be a harder nut to crack and even harder to find all the pieces.

Jayne looked up at me with a deep frown. Normally, when he looked at me, he either had a look of open concern or of pure, raw emotion. He’d only been mad at me a few times in our relationship. Maybe this one wouldn’t be too serious. If Jayne ever found out about Grease, I knew he would be very upset with me then, even though he’d have to reason to be.

“You have to stop doing this to us,” Jayne said.

“I don’t even know what the hell it is I’m doing wrong,” I said, sitting beside Jayne, facing him. His frown lessened a little.

“You wouldn’t think that someone like your brother would have something in common with a guy like me would you? Well, you’d be wrong. Neither one of us has seen you in a while and neither one of us want to lose you again. Now, I know that you aren’t like the other girls, and so does Mal. But you’re still his little sister and you know how I feel about you. When you’re gone like that, it reminds us of what it was like not having you around. We worry about you, Audra. Especially in times and places like these. We don’t mind you going off; we just need to know where you’re. Where did you go? I mean, I know what you were up to this morning…” he said.

“Well, I just went out for a ride. I guess time got away from me,” I said.

“It ain’t like you to go off for a ride and stay gone that long,” he said, lying back and looking at me sideways.

I nodded in agreement. “Yeah. I did go off for a reason. I’ll tell you later, since it’s about you, sort of. Right now, I’ve gotta talk to Mal and tell him how sorry I am. I guess I have been being selfish,” I said.

Jayne kissed me. “Not selfish. You’ve just been being yourself.”

After Jayne went back to Serendipity, I waited in the room alone for a few minutes, thinking more of how I’d tell Jayne about Grease. I’d gotten over Grease long before I’d even met Jayne, but I had a feeling that it was the right thing to do to tell him anyway. Normally, I didn’t have problems in romance and, when I did have problems, I sorted them out the old-fashioned way: time and luck.

“Jayne took the word’s right out of my mouth,” Mal said from behind me.

I turned to look up at him. “Accept my apology?” “Yeah. But look here, kid, you and me are all the family each other’s got, save for the crew. The last of the Jenkins,” he said and sat beside me.

“I know. I’m just used to being able to do what I want to do when I need to do it. Francis needed my help, so that’s where I went. I think I get that from you,” I said.

“Probably so. That and the way you split earlier are things I do a lot. Jayne’s right, as much as I hate to admit it. Neither one of us want to lose you again. That’s probably why I don’t shoot him every time he kisses you. I’ve got another person on my side to make sure nothing bad happens to you. What do you see in that thing, anyway? And so say a lot,” he smiled.

“Oh, at first I liked the mercenary lifestyle he led. He helped me with my headaches and nosebleeds when other people would have left me to die. Over time, I began to see things in him that he didn’t let other people see. He really is a kind person—to me anyway. He has a helluva sense of humor. He’d be better off if he thought about what he say before he says it. He’s honest, though, and I need to take a leaf out of his book. Don’t ask any questions before I’m done,” I said, handing him the disk I’d gotten off the blue-gloved thing.

After I’d told him, he didn’t say a word for a few seconds. “I’ll give it to Simon and see what he thinks it is. You need to go to bed so you’ll be ready for tomorrow.” He yawned and we walked out to Serendipity.

“You mad at me?” I asked.

“No. You wear a person out, though. No wonder Mom had to take headache medicine.”

“Mmm-hmm. Another thing I get from you, I believe.”

I went to my room to put away my knife and then went to shower. When I got out, I went directly to Jayne’s room. When he didn’t answer after I knocked, I assumed he was asleep and went back to my own bed. He needed his rest for what he would have to do in the up-coming days and so did I. I put the kitten under my cover and closed my eyes, unable to sleep. All I thought about was the look Jayne had in his eyes when he said he didn’t want to lose me again. He’d never been that sincere before and I didn’t want to tell him about Grease. If I knew he’d not make anything of it, I’d tell him without worrying. Jayne was very territorial, though, and I new I had to tell him before Grease could. I didn’t trust Grease enough to tell him the truth, so I had to do it and do it fast. Jayne wouldn’t take Grease’s word over mine, but he’d still see it as a betrayal that I didn’t tell before he found out about it from someone else.

“Hey, open up,” a voice said from outside my door.

I sat up and walked over to the door. It wasn’t Jayne or Mal for that matter. What would Book, Wash, or Simon have to tell me so late in the night? When I opened the door, I confirmed my thoughts. It wasn’t any of the men of Serendipity. It was Zoe.

My laughter rang throughout the entire ship. “God, girl, I thought you were a man,” I said. She put her hand over her mouth to silence me and pushed me back in my room.

“Sorry to displease you, Audra. I need your help.”

“Hmm, this sounds interesting. Surely you didn’t mess up one of your weapons. I’d have to come to you with that problem. What’s the matter? What to know how to create men repellent?” I asked, still laughing.

“Actually, quiet the opposite. I need something to attract men, or, at least, one man, to me,” she said.

“Hate to break it to ya, sister, but all you have to do is wear short shorts. You know this. What I want to know is, who’s this man? Aren’t you married?” I asked.

She rolled her eyes. “Yes. That’s who I’m trying to attract.”

“Marriage is the ultimate attraction.” “You’re not going to help me, are you?” she asked, annoyed.

“Alright… attraction Wash Granette, lesson number one: be your fine self.”

“He’s tired of me,” she said and sat down. I turned the lights on and sat beside her, holding my hand on her shoulder.

“You’re serious?” I asked.

“Afraid so, kid,” she said, rubbing her forehead. “You want to know that he still loves you, don’t you?” I asked.

“I know he still loves me. Did you see Jeralla and her girls. I’m afraid I don’t hold a candle to them. Look at me. I could be the next best tomboy,” she laughed bitterly.

“Me too,” I said, looking down and my scars and my rugged clothes.

“Yeah. And Jayne loves the hell out of you. You should have heard him today when you were helping Francis with her baby. He had every opportunity to grab a bite of those girls. He didn’t. He just sat there and told them stories of you that I’d never heard myself. I want Wash to think of me like that,” she said, looking down at the floor.

“How do you know he doesn’t?”

“Because of how I act. You’ve been all over Jayne since you got here and I know you’d act that way if you’d seen him every day of his life. He knows it too. Sometimes I’m too bitter with Wash. I just want to show him that I appreciate him and that I do love him, even though I don’t always act like it. He deserves me to be pretty sometimes.”

“Zoe, I’m a lot more bitter with Jayne than you could ever be with Wash, believe me. But I do know what you’re saying. I need to do the same thing with Jayne,” I said and then told her what I needed to do concerning Grease and Jayne. She agreed that telling Jayne would be a good idea, that she had some things she needed to tell Wash. I didn’t pry into what it was she had to say, I just took comfort knowing that someone I knew had the same problem.

“I know what we can do. Since the fight isn’t until tomorrow, we can get up early and go over to the house. Jeralla can loan us some of her clothes. We can dress up for them.” I said.

“Good idea, kiddo. I’ll come get you up in the morning.”

I walked Zoe out of my room and glanced across the ship at Jayne’s door. It was still closed. Zoe looked at me reassuringly and I smiled, turning to go back in my room. Maybe playing dress-up would ease the air of any tension and I could tell Jayne with him being in a good mood.

* * *

Zoe got me up before sunrise the next day and we quietly crept over to the house. Mal joined us, saying he needed to talk with Jeralla about a few things. The blush on his cheeks told me that he was taking Jeralla’s promised services to the bank. I went to check on Francis, who was doing just fine. Zoe asked if she could hold Jonah. “Sure you can. Any friend of Audra’s is a friend of mine. I’m letting all my friends hold my baby,” she said, smiling.

“You look better today,” I said.

“Only cuz I hain’t got a baby squeezin itself into the world through my legs,” she laughed.

I laughed, too, and watched Zoe with the baby. She had a smile on her face as she swayed back and forth with the baby. Zoe had done an excellent job of raising me and I knew she wanted her own baby someday. She would be an excellent mother.

“Say, Franny, you got any dresses and makeup that me and Zoe here could borrow?” I asked. “Sure. There’s a bunch of stuff in my trunks over there that I don’t use. You can have whatever you want. It’s all clean. There’s some makeup and perfume in them drawers yonder,” she said. Zoe gave Jonah back to her and we both went over to the drawers to pick out dresses. We changed our clothes behind the vision-visor in the corner.

Zoe found a brown, silk dress that circled around her shoulders, was tight around the torso, and billowy around the skirt area. She kept her boots on under it because they went well with the dress. A brown scarf was tied around her long, brown hair, going perfectly with her caramel complexion.

I put on a red lacey dress that had no sleeves whatsoever. Underneath was a white, satin gown that dropped past my feet. I let my hair hang down, covering the tattoos on my upper arms. My boots only went with mud, so I took them off and put on a pair of white sandals.

“Yawl are pretty as everything. Who’s heart are you gon’ break?” Francis asked.

“My husband and Jayne,” Zoe said, smiling down at her new self.

“Well, don’t break em too bad. Yer gon have to carry em home,” Francis said, yawning. I took Jonah from her and put him in the crib so she could sleep.

Zoe and I left the room and walked slowly down the hall, both of us not used to wearing dresses. I had a bad feeling that I was going to trip over the end of my dress and fall right on top of Zoe, crushing her at the foot of the stairs.

“Wonder if this is why men were once so dominant?” I asked.

“I know what you mean. How can people run in these without holding them up over their heads?” I laughed. “Just think: what would Inara do?”

“Oh, that helps me a lot,” she scoffed.

Zoe and I made it to the front room with no problem. Actually, it was then that our only problem occurred. It was only about nine in the morning and Jeralla already had a bunch of business. There weren’t enough girls to go around per guy, so the girls two or three guys a piece up to the rooms. Jeralla and Inara looked at us from the circular couch where they were “conducting business” and smiled.

“You want to help us out?” Jeralla asked.

“Not really,” I said. I spotted Jayne and Wash up on the overhang and waved.

“Actually, why not? You don’t have to sleep with em, right?” Zoe asked.

“That’s right. Not all companions do,” Inara said.

“You sure you know what you’re doing?” I asked Zoe.

“Not really,” she said through grit teeth.

Zoe and I sat near Inara and Jeralla, talking to the guys. Finally, Wash and Jayne walked up to us.

“Are you busy, ma’am?” Wash asked Zoe, holding out his hand.

“Not at the moment,” Zoe said, taking his hand and pulling herself up. Zoe laughed as Wash picked her up and carried her out the front door.

“Wonder if he carries her over the threshold or if she does it for him,” Inara said under her breath.

Jayne looked down at me and sighed, putting his hands on his hips. “Now, my girlfriend ain’t gonna like me doin this but I can’t seem to help myself. Would you like to come with me to my ship? There’s lot’s more privacy and I can show you my guns,” he said.

“Maybe later, stranger. I wanna hear more about this girlfriend of yours,” I said. I heard Jeralla laugh at this.

“None of the other girls here wanted to,” he said, his pouty face making me smile.

“Aww, Jayne, you big monkey,” I said affectionately and hugged him.

“How sweet,” Inara said softly.

“I can’t believe you’re wearin a dress. Now I’ve seen everything.”

“Uh-uhhh. You haven’t seen nothing yet,” I said.

Jayne picked me up and carried me outside, Inara and Jeralla laughing behind me.

When we got outside, we met up with Zoe and Wash, who’d been stopped by Mal and Simon. They were talking softly about something. Zoe was no longer smiling and Wash was back to being serious. Actually, they all had serious expressions on their faces.

“Talk about raining on a parade,” Jayne whispered in my ear as he put me down.

I nodded in agreement. “What’s the trouble, little brother?” I asked Mal.

“Oh, nothing much. Just that we’re deciding whether or not to help Simon and his sister,” he said.

“You need a vacation. Let me do it. It has something to do with that disk, doesn’t it?” I asked, squeezing Jayne’s hand in mine.

“Yeah, that’s right. It does. We can’t worry about it one way or the other now, can we? We already have too much on our plate,” Mal said. I looked at Simon and nodded. “Yeah, he’s right. We have to do this stuff first.”

* * *

Jayne and I walked out to the garden and sat on a stone bench under a low tree, using it to cover us up from the sun. He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees as he looked at me. I put my head to his shoulder, waiting for the right words to say. When none came, I decided that the best way to tell him about Grease was the old-fashioned way: straightforwardness.

“You met Grease yet?” I asked.

“Not really. I just saw him this mornin.” Jayne said.

“That’s good,” I said.

I told Jayne in as few words as possible about my dating Grease as a teenager. He didn’t seem to care at first, which was how I’d hoped he’d act. The look in his eyes told me something different, though. There was something about my story that he didn’t quiet buy.

“What?” I asked.

He shrugged, leaning back against the tree. “Why tell me now?” “Because I thought you should hear it from me first, before Grease could open his big mouth.”

“Ah, hell, Audra, you know I trust you over anybody,” he said.

“Well, I still felt that I had to tell you first. It’s only right,” I said.

Jayne brought me into his lap and kissed me. “I’ll never get you, ya know. One of these days I’m gonna go crazy tryin to. I know there ain’t nothin going on between you and that guy. Remember, I’ve known you more than any other guy ever has. You’re stuck with me, no matter how mad you get me and no matter what you think you did that I won’t like. I don’t care what anybody says, not Mal, Grease, or you.” His blue eyes shown out from under his dark brows like two blue diamonds. The way the redness of the sunrise shown on him and all that surrounded him, making this entire conversation very surreal. I knew that I would remember Jayne this way for the rest of my life, no matter what happened in the days or years to come.

“There’s nobody else I’d want to be stuck to as much as you,” I said. Jayne smiled and wrapped his arms around me, giving me a rare hug. “I wish we could stay like this forever.”

He sighed, patting down my hair. “I know. Maybe we can.”

“Maybe. Has Mal been saying something about us?” I asked.

“Not all that much. I don’t blame him, though. He loves you as much as I do. He just wants you to be safe.”

“What did he say?” I asked, pulling away from Jayne just enough to be able to look him in the eye.

“Oh, the usual big brother stuff, you know. Like how he’d kill me if I ever broke your heart,” he smiled.

“What did you say?”

“Said it’d be hard to kill a dead man, since you’d probably kill me first. That is, if I didn’t kill my own damn self,” he said through grit teeth.

I laughed. “I think I’ll go back to calling you my monkey.” Monkey had been my nickname for Jayne when we first started dating. He had a simian-like quality about him and he was bigger than most men. He hated it, so I stopped calling him that. It didn’t really apply any more, he seemed smaller than he had and he had cut back on his crazy, sporadic “monkeying around” and acted more like a gorilla now. Still, as I imagined him talking to my brother, he seemed to have that monkey-like quality again.

“Tell me you’re kidding,” he said seriously. I got off his lap and ran a few steps away, holding the dress up so I didn’t step on it. “Catch me and I might change my mind.”

“You’ll be sorry when I get you,” he said and ran after me. The dress slowed me down and he caught me just as I went past the gate that circled the garden. “Damn, girl, you’re getting slow in your old age.”

I laughed as he threw me over his shoulder as if I weighed no more than a sack of flour. He carried me inside and put me on the couch. “I’ll show you old age,” I said and jumped on his back. “Alright, children, time to eat,” Inara said, ducking under my feet as Jayne swung me around. I looked over at the table under the over-hang and noticed that there was a door to the right of it, hidden from the view of the door. I guessed that was where the kitchen was.

* * *

“Wow! Food!” River said, running into the room. She was followed by a boy about her age. We all had a seat at the table and I finally counted how many girls Jeralla had. Other than her and my crew, there were five girls and the boy that River sat with. In all, there were 17 of us, including Francis and Jonah, and just enough chairs. One person that I (gratefully) noticed as missing was Grease.

“Everyone here?” Book asked.

“Let’s see…” River said and counted heads. “Yep. Where’s that big guy, though?”

“Grease had to go home. He’ll be back in a few hours,” the boy said. Mal didn’t have any sort of reaction to this news, so I figured he knew. “I propose a toast!” Wash said, loud enough to be heard up and down the table.

I winked over at Zoe and she smiled. Everyone picked up their glasses and held them high.

“To Audra and Zoe, for doing the impossible. They wore a dress!” Wash said, making Zoe laugh.

“Here, here!” Jayne said.

“To the best wife and best girl in the whole damn universe,” Wash said and kissed Zoe’s cheek. We all cheered the happy couple and even Mal was happy. Downing our drinks, we started eating.

“You know, though, Audra has worn a few dresses in her time,” Inara said.

“Really?” Jayne asked.

“When she worked for Q-Jaus, they were a part of her uniform. Not as lovely as that one, though, but a dress nevertheless.”

“What else did you do at the school?” Francis asked.

“Took care of Jeralla and Inara, made sure they didn’t get, um, taken advantage of. They never did, not on my watch,” I said and toasted myself. “Was it exciting?” Callie asked.

I shrugged. “Could have been better. It did get better when Inara hired me out of the school. I didn’t have to wear dresses anymore and I got to do things besides wait by her door for her business to be over with. Nowhere near as exciting as your life, Callie girl.”

“You think my life is exciting?” she asked. I nodded. “Yeah. You’re, what?, seven or eight years younger than me? You get to work for my brother. I remember there were guys and gals lined up all over the place wanting jobs like you and Wash have. He’s a damn legend.” “Yeah, but no offense to the captain,” she said and looked at him.

“None taken,” he said and sipped his wine, interest lining his features.

“But you got to do your own stuff. Like knife-throwing contests with Jayne, looking after Inara and Jeralla here, and who knows what else. Sometimes I wish I was like that,” she said. “But you are. You noticed that I had to start with my brother and he taught me how to shoot and things like that. Then I got to do my own stuff. Believe me, it isn’t all that glamorous. Some days I wish I just stayed in bed or lay around all day, eating ice cream. It wears you out, even if you’ve been doing it forever. You probably won’t get shot at as much as I have and you have a much more important job. You know ships. I only know how to fly some of them.” “Still, adventure lacks in being a mechanic,” she said sadly.

“Put it this way, kiddo. You gots brains. Best keep em.” I said, doing my best impression of Mal, who glared at me.

Callie smiled. “I want to do something to help. I mean, I know you’re saying I’m helping by flying the Mag, but I don’t really feel like I am.”

“I see. Wanna bet? You ever flew a Mag?” I asked. She shook her head “no.” “Well, if you and Wash can’t get the Reevers out of the way, all we do tomorrow won’t matter. Now that’s what I call an adventure: flying 230 in a curve, outmaneuvering a Reever motor-ship. Callie, there is no copilot in a Mag. One flies the ship, the other uses the weapons. You’ll have the rest of the day for Wash and Grease to teach you how to fly. If Grease won’t do it, I will. Imagine that. Going 230 in a curve.”

“Wait, you mean the Mag has a weapons system?” Callie asked.

Wash nodded. “It’s a laser system at that. Very hot stuff. I had to train for 6 months on how to keep the right temp. Motor-ships may have good shields, but this Mag will fry it. But weapons are last resort. Flying this thing is simple, it’s the speed that gets to people. It’ll be your job to keep me from having to use the weapons. Like she said, outmaneuver the Reevers, Callie. What an adventure.”

She smiled and went back to eating. It was Mal’s turn to speak, but he couldn’t seem to get what words he had in his mouth to come out. “Yes, smartass?” I asked.

“How likely will it be to have to use the weapons?” he asked.

“Not too bad. There are some huge space rocks up there and the Mag can turn on a dime, if you get what I’m saying.”

“You think we can get them to fly into one of the rocks?” Wash asked.

“I don’t know. It depends on the skill of the pilot of this motor-ship and whatever you have to work with out there. The motor-ships also burn more gas than the Mag. The Mag holds nearly as much gas at Serendipity but, since it’s so light, it’ll fly for hours and hours in one direction and still have enough gas to get back. If you get stuck out there, activate the auxiliary power and switch to autopilot. The Mag will return to where it was when it was last on land. No problem,” I said.

“You sure you shouldn’t be up there instead of down here?” Jeralla asked.

“Wash knows all this about the ship plus some. And the fact that he’s an excellent pilot makes him a much better candidate. He should definitely be up there.”

“How do you know that Wash is such a good pilot?” Mal asked.

“Because you picked him. And anyone who knows about the heating system on a Mag has flown one before, and flown it very fast. You do have to train to be able to use the weapons, no matter how much of a natural talent you are supposed to have,” I said, pointing my fork at myself.

“Sounds scary. I couldn’t do it,” Francis said, giving her baby his bottle. “It is scary. That’s what I’m sayin to Callie. She has a big, important job,” I said. “I know that now. I finally get to do something,” she said and playfully shoved Mal’s shoulder.

“Oh, you want more important jobs, huh? I’ll have to consider that when we go to GroingTavelers and get whatever it is that Simon needs. That’s where we’re going next, just in case any of you were wonderin,” Mal said to Callie, with a glance at Simon. Simon hid his smile behind his napkin.

“When are you planning on leaving?” Jeralla asked Mal.

“We could stay a few days after we are done with the Reevers, if that’s okay with you and your girls,” he said calmly.

I raised my eyebrows at Inara, who returned my look with a shrug. “That’ll be fine. You and your crew is welcome here any time you want to. Audra already has an undying invitation, though she never does take advantage of it.” Jeralla said, turning the attention from her and Mal to me.

“Because I always have to act as midwife every time I see you,” I smiled.

Francis and Jeralla laughed. “Who many have you delivered now?” Jeralla asked me.

“Seven, here. Four at other places. Can’t wait until Inara has a baby. Or you.”

“Not going to happen,” Inara and Jeralla said together.

* * *

I cleaned my plate and went up to get my old clothes. I changed Francis’s sheets so she wouldn’t have to, and went back downstairs. Simon, Mal, Jayne, and Zoe sat talking about the plans for the next day and, through the open door, I could see Callie and Wash in the cockpit of the Mag, Wash going over controls and other things. Book sat at the now-clean table, reading to Inara, Jeralla, River, and the other girls. Jayne sat in the doorway, sharpening a knife. “’Scyoose me, stranger. Is this seat taken?” I asked Jayne as I stepped out the door, turning to face him.

“Yeah. I’m waitin for the pretty girl I had lunch with,” he said, smiling up at me.

“Don’t tell me you liked that dress that much,” I said, putting my hands on my hips.

“Well, not that much,” he said, looking at my bare legs.

“Yeah, go ahead and laugh, monkey. I’ve got so many scars on my legs that they don’t look like legs anymore,” I said.

“Looks good enough for me. Have a seat,” he said. I sat down and he put my right leg over his lap.

“I remember when you got this one. You pushed me out of the way of a bullet and a piece of glass came flying out of that broke window. And this one, it goes up your thigh and up to your belly,” he said, running his hand up my leg. “Hey, hands off,” Mal shouted behind us.

I turned around and stuck my tongue out at him. “Well, at least we know who’s older,” he said. Zoe laughed and turned his attention to the plans Simon had been drawing out.

Jayne shook his head. “He’s gonna kill me for it’s over with. Anyway, and this leg over here, a bullet went right through the back of your calf and came out the other end and hit me here, remember?” he said and patted his thigh.

“Yeah. Neither one of us could walk right for a while,” I smiled.

“These legs and me, we been through a lot together,” he said and smiled. I wrapped my right arm around his neck and pulled his head down to mine and kissed him passionately. Over my head, a laser went up into the sky. I looked over at the Mag and Wash gave Jane and me a thumbs up signal, making both of us laugh and return his thumbs up.

“Fireworks,” I said, resting the top of my head against the side of his face. Jayne laughed and kissed my head.

“Hey, lovebirds, do that some other time. We need Audra over here,” Simon said.

“Simon says…” Jayne stated.

“I gotta go,” I said and kissed him quickly before getting up and walking back into the room.

* * *

“So, what’s up?” I asked, sitting beside Mal.

“We need to know how good of a shot you are,” Simon said, looking down at the papers in front of him.

“Shoot him, that’ll be knowledge enough,” Jayne said seriously, still sitting in the doorway, sharpening his knife.

I smiled over at him and then looked down at the plans. Simon had drawn a map of the house with the surrounding desert. He had drawn an X on where Sigmund would come from and an O where we would fire at them from. The Mag would be parked at the back of the house, out of the way. The only thing it would do on land was fly, the weapons being —as a safety precaution—inoperable unless out in space.

“Where are you putting me?” I asked, studying the map.

Simon pointed at the corner of the garden, where the gate door met the gate. “How good of a shot are you?”

“Jayne’s right. Come on,” I said, pulling him from his seat.

I grabbed Mal’s gun from its holster and we went outside.

“You’re gonna shoot me?!” Simon asked, scared.

“No, dumbass. She’s gonna barely miss you,” Jayne said, standing and walking out into the yard.

I walked Simon over to the tree in the garden and put a tin can on his head. Mal and Zoe stood next to Jayne, both not knowing what to think. I walked as far away from Simon as I could, still being in the yard of the house, having a clear shot at him. Raising the gun, I turned my head and fired two times. The way he screamed sounded as if I had hit him, but I knew different.

“Bravo, little sister. You scared Simon,” Mal said. He gave me the can when I got back to the group.

“There’s only one hole in that can. Where did you shoot the other?” Zoe asked.

Jayne and Mal began laughing. “Hey, Callie, come here!” Jayne yelled over to Callie and Wash, who’d gotten out of the Mag to watch the target practice.

“Talk about pretty legs,” I said to Simon, pointing down at his feet. His pants were down around his legs.

“Oh, my god,” Simon said, pulling them up before Callie could get over to him. “How’d you do that?” Zoe asked, now smiling at Simon’s shock.

“I’ll tell you how she did it: she shot my belt. It was the only thing holding these up. They aren’t my best pair of pants.”

“Highly observant of you, little sister,” Mal said as I gave his gun back to him.

“Well, he wanted to know how good of a shot I was. I used to practice on Jayne,” I said, smiling over at Jayne, who sat on the fence, continuing to laugh at Simon.

“Well, at least you got a compliment out of it,” Mal said to him.

“Compliment?” Callie asked, walking over to me. “She said Simon had pretty legs.”

Callie smiled over at him. “Oh, I already know that,” she said sweetly, making Simon blush.

* * *

“So, what’s the plan?” I asked Simon when we all had gone back to what we were doing.

“Totally changed as far as you’re concerned. Who taught you to shoot like that?” he asked, tying his belt around his waist.

“My two favorite men in the world,” I said, motioning to Mal and Jayne.

“Should have known. But they aren’t always entirely accurate.”

“Well, no one is, now are they?” I asked, making him go pale again.

Simon told me, that since I could shoot, that I would ride out and find what it was we had to face and come back. If I had a scope, I could knock off a few of the bad-looking ones, including the leader, Sigmunds.

“When do I go?” I asked Mal.

“Four a.m. tomorrow. You think you can handle it? You are a better shot than Zoe or any of us for that matter, and you’re lighter. There’s only one horse here. Or, there will be when Grease gets back,” Mal said.

“Can’t I go?” Jayne asked, disapproving of my going.

“You’re bigger than Mal and Zoe put together. You’d be too heavy,” Simon said.

“It’s just too damn dangerous,” Jayne said. “I know that, Jayne. Audra can handle it. She fought the battle of Durlington almost alone. There were thousands of people and she got out alive.” Mal said this, his frowning face never leaving Jayne.

I rolled my eyes. Apparently, Book had told Mal about the battle. I hadn’t fought alone, I’d had a small army of local teenagers helping me. Most of them died, and I’d almost been killed myself. The enemy ran scared when I rode out in a CR7, the most powerful weapon-ship in existence at the time. Mal was right, though, I knew how to tell who had more power in an army. Killing the leaders off reduced company morale 50 percent. Without a leader, most people had no reason to fight, especially when the leader’s personal problems and wants are what got them out there in the beginning.

All eyes looked at me, waiting for my decision. “This must be a little ass horse,” I said.

“No. But what if something happens to the horse and you have to come back on foot? There are tiny cervices all over the ground out there. Perfect place to hide if you need it. And they are 30 to 40 percent cooler than the outside area. It’s up to you, Audra. What do you want to do?” Simon asked.

“I’ll go. Just tell me what Sigmunds looks like,” I said.

* * *

Simon gave me a picture of Sigmunds that Jeralla had given him. I went to my room on Serendipity to take a nap, knowing I’d better go to bed while I was tired. Simon, Mal, and Zoe seemed to breath easier now that they had someone to do this. I had no doubt that I could do it. Jayne, on the other hand, didn’t want me to go. He knew as well as I did that I had done worse, more dangerous things than this.

I lay on my bed and poured Kitty some food. I noticed she had a collar on now. It was leather and had blue crystals around it. The collar looked like something that might have belonged to Inara but I doubted she had given it to the cat. If Inara took an interest in Kitty, she would keep her in her room and spoil her. If she had anything to spoil her with, she would have already taken her. Maybe it had been River who’d given her the collar, River or Callie. I’d ask them later.

When I went to sleep this time, I was too tired to remember my dreams and I slept peacefully. If I had to get up at four in the morning and take a ride on a horse, I’d need more sleep than what I’d get even if no one woke me up until four. When I woke up, it was 6 p.m. By the way that I felt, I knew I wouldn’t be able to go back to sleep if I had sleeping pills to assist me. I rolled out of the bed and went to take a shower. When I got out, I went to my room to put on some clothes. Jayne was there, lying on the bed. He looked up at me with a look in his eyes unknown to me from him. He could have been mad or tired, I really couldn’t tell. He kicked the door closed with one long leg and it locked. Jayne pulled the towel from around me and threw it behind him. “Just so you know you have something to come back to this time. You be careful out there,” he said as he pulled me to the bed, pressing my back to the sheets.

An hour or so later we lay close together, looking up at the dark room. “I wonder if Mal thinks I’m still asleep,” I laughed.

“I don’t much care what Mal thinks right now. He’s the fool-headed dummy sending you out there with no idea what you’ll meet up with,” he said, running his hands down my arms.

“It’s my choice, Jaynie. You know I’ve been through more difficult stuff than this. You were there a few times,” I said, bending my knee between his legs.

“Yeah. I was there to watch you. And the other times, I wish I had been there. I probably would have stopped you,” he said.

“Yeah, but you couldn’t stop me. I’m bull-headed like you, remember?” I said.

“I know. Doesn’t mean that I’m not going to worry about you, though.”

“I hope you do, even though you know you don’t have to. I can take care of myself. You forget I beat you at a knife-throwing contest and I saved your butt several times. It’s good to know that someone loves me enough to needlessly worry about me. You’d worry about me even if we were locked up in a small room together with anything we would ever want. You’re just a natural worry wart, Monkey.”

He kissed my temple and then my hand. “It’s your fault.”

I put my head on his chest and my forehead to his neck. “You know, you hardly ever hug me.” He laughed. “Because I’m busy kissing you or something like that. Why? You want me to?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

He put his arms around me and I closed my eyes, my thoughts of not being able to go back to sleep laughing at me. “I can’t believe I let you call me Monkey,” I heard Jayne say before drifting back to sleep.

* * *

When I woke up next, the time was nearing midnight. I got dressed and covered Jayne up. He opened his eyes and I told him to go back to sleep, that I’d come back to get him before I left.

After I left the ship, I heard a strange sound coming from beside the house. The sound was familiar, but I couldn’t place it. The door to the house stood open, the light was on, and I noticed people moving around inside. As I got closer, I noticed that Simon was sleeping in the doorway.

“Waiting for me, doc?” I asked, gently shaking him awake.

His eyes fluttered open and he stared blankly at me for a few minutes. “What…oh, yeah. You ready to go?” he asked.

“Might as well be, right? Anybody here knows how to ride a horse?” I asked as I went inside. “You mean you don’t know how?” Zoe asked from the couch she had turned into a bed.

“Nope. Never had the need for a horse,” I said, going over to the bar.

“What’s the problem? All you do is get on a ride. Thought you were an expert?” Grease said from the table.

“Pour me some guts,” I told Jeralla, who was behind the bar. I totally ignored what Grease said. Jeralla poured me a small, strong drink, and I downed it with one quick swallow.

“Come on, I’ll show you how,” Simon said.

“Think you can learn that fast?” Zoe asked.

“How difficult can a horse be? If I fall off, I’ll kill whoever tells Jayne or Mal. Fair enough?” I asked everyone. No one said a word. Grease and Simon went to get the horse and I waited for them at the front of the house. A light at the front of the house came on and Jeralla stepped out. “I thought you needed the drink for some guts for your ride.”

“I did. That horse is gonna be scarier than anything Sigmund can throw at me. I’m scared of em.”

The animal that Simon brought around to the front of the house was not a horse, at least not to me anyway. It was way too big. The horse was as black as the devil and towered over Grease who was at least six and a half feet tall. The horse screamed at me and I jumped back, falling over the gate door. Simon laughed loudly and Grease turned his head to hide a smile. “Go ahead and laugh. Getting back at me for shooting your pants off, aren’t you?” I asked angrily, only making Simon laugh harder. The big, black beast snorted down at me like a demon from hell. I shivered to think that I would have to learn how to ride this animal, in such a short time, at that. The horse, if one could call it that, had no saddle and seemed to be at one with the dark night around it. The way the animal acted was as if he didn’t have a care in the world. He was laughing at me; I could see this in his huge, powerful eyes. I didn’t like to be laughed at. If it took all day, I would conquer this beast of an animal.

“Come on, Audra, get on,” Simon said.

A lump rose in my throat. “How?”

Simon sniggered. “Come here,” he said, taking me to the left side of the horse.

He stood me beside the left shoulder of the beast, facing the horse’s saddle and put the reins in my left hand, which lay on the horse’s neck in front of the raised part of the saddle. Simon told me to put my left foot in the stirrup and to put my right hand on the back of the saddle. I was told to pull my self up transferring body weight to my left foot and hands. I took my right hand from the back of the saddle and swung my right leg up and across the horse’s back, therefore straddling the horse and sitting in the saddle.

“Whoa!” I said loudly as the horse took a sideways step.

Grease rubbed the animal behind the ears and smiled up at me. “You know, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you so vulnerable.”

I pulled out my gun and pointed it at him. “How about now?” I asked and he laughed when the horse took another step, causing me to jump. “What in the world have they got you doin’, little sister?” Mal asked as he came out of the house.

“What’s it look like, Mal? I’m walking in the park,” I said, angry.

“You will definitely be walking in the park when you fall off,” Simon said, steadying the horse for me.

I bent down and patted the horse on the neck. “Or he’ll pull me all the way back here, won’t ya, Jayne?” I said to the horse, calling it Jayne because of how big he was.

The horse’s ears picked up at this and I swore he laughed at me again. Simon looked up at me, an expression of interest on his solemn, babyface. I lowered my voice until I could barely hear it and began singing to the horse. I sang the same song that Inara had been singing to the baby: Take Me to My Dream.

“Where are you going, where have you been? If you aren’t going far, tell me where, then. Take me with you when you go. Because then we will already know. Take me to my dream. Take me to my dream. Let me lead you where I have you when I sleep. It will only be you and me, so take me to my dream,” I sang the song, not noticing that, as I got louder, Simon, Grease, and Mal could hear me.

The horse shook his head up and down and began to walk. Butterflies rose up in my stomach as I saw the earth moving underneath me without my feet doing the moving. The horse was gentle, though, as he walked out of the gate and to the drier ground. After I was used to this slow speed, the horse sped up. This happened until he was running around and around the house, faster and faster until the things around me began to blur. When I told the horse to stop, I pulled on his reigns and he slowed down and took me back to the gate where Simon, Mal, and Grease stood watching.

“I think I can ride now. Lemme see if I can get down by myself,” I said and patted the horse’s neck.

I took hold of the front of the saddle and threw my right leg behind me while I kept my left foot in the stirrup. When my right foot touched the ground, my left knee was all the way up to my chest.

“Well, at least I didn’t fall off,” I said. As I said this, my foot became caught in the stirrup and I fell backwards, right on my butt. Mal laughed as he came over to help me up. “Yeah, at least you didn’t fall off the horse,” he said, picking me up by the arm. Simon told me that it was 2:30. Mal said for me to eat a light breakfast and drink a lot of water before I left, that there was no telling how hot the desert could get out there. Simon and Grease loaded the horse with supplies that I might need which included water, ammo, a spare gun, and a hydr-ox shot, should I run out of water. The shot would keep me from dehydrating. I went in the house, grabbed a small bowl of fruit, and went back to Serendipity to wake Jayne up. He was already awake when I got there, since I met him at the door on his way over to the house. We walked back towards the house slowly, talking about my ride.

“I didn’t think you could ride a horse,” he smiled when I told him about the big, black beast.

“I don’t think I can, still. This horse lets me ride him, I think. I sung to it and it let ride without me doing anything else.”

“Mmm-hmm. Now you’re a horse charmer,” Jayne said, skeptic.

“I’m not lying. It’s a great big horse, so I thought of something else that was big. I thought of you and what would make you move. The last time I sang, you ran like crazy,” I said, smiling up at him.

“Yeah, I did. And if I had been a horse, I would have bucked you off. So, you think you can do this ride?” he asked.

“I don’t know why, but yeah. If all horses are like this one, I do believe that I’m no longer afraid of them. You ought to see him. You won’t believe how big he is,” I said, pulling him to the back of the house where the horse was.

Grease and Simon were back there with it, talking to each other as the animal ate out of Simon’s hand. I tensed when I noticed that this would be the first time that Jayne and Grease would see each other when I was there. Luckily, Jayne didn’t seem to notice Grease and Grease was too preoccupied with the horse’s bridle to notice anything much at all.

“He’s a big one,” Jayne said, shaking his head. Jayne pulled himself up on the horse with ease and straightened the bridle up with a single motion. Simon came over to me as Jayne rode the horse out the desert.

“You ready to go?” he asked, paying no attention to Jayne’s taking the horse.

I nodded and Simon led me inside to where River slept on the couch. He gently reached into River’s pants pocket and pulled out a small, red ball. He put in between his forefinger and thumb and squeezed it gently. Up out of the top came a holographic map of the area.

“Just in case you get lost. Grease gave it to River last night, showing her where he lives. I think it’ll be more use to you. The horse is a good, strong ride and you shouldn’t have to worry about walking. The horse also knows the way back here, since he originally belonged to Francis before she became pregnant and could no longer ride. You must come back here. We need you when we go to GroingTavelers. I know this sounds nasty of me, but I need you to be alive when you get back,” he said, wrinkles distorting his normally smooth brow.

“I’ll be back. Don’t worry about that. Maybe we’ll find out a few things about my situation, too,” I said, smacking him gently on the shoulder.

I put the ball in my pocket and went out the front door and then past the gate. It was now 3:15, not long until I had to ride out to find Sigmund. Looking out by the Mag, I saw Jayne and Mal angrily discussing something. The horse was coming my way, as if trying to get away from Jayne and Mal’s bickering. Mounting the horse with ease, this time, I rode out to Mal.

“Okay if I go ahead, little brother? Not quite used to this riding thing, you know,” I said, looking down at them, interrupting their argument.

Jayne looked up at me, crossing his arms. Mal’s jaw clenched. “I’ve been thinking that maybe you shouldn’t go. Jayne’s right. It’s too dangerous,” Mal said.

I sighed. “Okay. Be that way. I’m not on your ship and I don’t have to do what you say. Still, I feel obligated to help in anyway that I can. Simon’s right. I am the only one for this part of the job. I’ve been in battles worse than this and I’m going. Nuff said,” I said and smacked the horse on the rump.

“Get back here or I swear to god,” Mal and Jayne said at the same time, before branching off to their own threats.

“I’ll be back in a few hours. Mark my word,” I shouted back to them.

* * *

At first, the weather was cool. I rode along, following Simon’s map in my mind. I began to have fun, feeling free from anything as the desert air swept through my hair. When the sun came up, though, I began to get hot. The horse began to sweat after a while and I slowed him down. I got off and gave the horse a sip of his water while I got a sip of mine. Looking at my surroundings, I knew that we were nearly at the point in which I would meet up with Sigmunds. “Nearly there, old fella,” I said to myself more than to the horse. I got back on and rode for 10 minutes more. Right in front of me, a mile or so ahead, I could see a big horde of ants. Or, at least they looked like ants. They were people: a lot of them coming at a very fast pace.

I looked around for a place to hide. There was a red clay hill to my right with enough rocks to hide behind. I rode over and hid the horse in the shadow, letting it hide from the sun as well as from the approaching men. Climbing up the mountain, I hid behind a nearby boulder. I could see the approaching small army. They wouldn’t see me until it was too late.

Taking my scope from my side, I attached it to the gun. I looked out at the approaching people, but they were still too far away to make out any of their faces. As they got closer, I found my mark. Sigmunds was riding right out in front, two young boys on each side. There seemed to be at least 40 men, all had guns and angry, trigger-happy faces.

Leveling my gun on the boulder, I aimed at Sigmunds. I shot him, the boys at his side, and two other people in the head. They were too far away to see me, so I still had time to load my gun for the second round of shooting. Overhead raced two air-ships, each carrying about 10 men. I let them pass, hoping they wouldn’t turn around and see their fallen comrades or me and my black ride.

By the time the men got close enough to shoot at me, there were only five left. I was completely out of ammo and dizzy from the heat. It had been a good half-hour after seeing the air-ship fly over and I wondered how my brother was faring with the primitive weapons on the ships and the people who’d rode in on them.

Taking my knife out of its case, I slid down the side of the mountain, careful not to bring attention to myself. One of the men had their back to me. I snuck up behind him and pressed the blade to his throat.

“Put your guns down or I’ll slit your friend’s throat.”

The four remaining men did as they were told. I tied them to each other with rope from one of the men’s horses and tied them to a rock behind the mountain where the horse was. As I was checking the sky for noise, I heard a gunshot and then felt instant pain in my side. One of the people whom I’d thought I’d killed had shot me. Acting quickly, I pulled my knife again and threw it at him. The blade went through his neck, cutting his head off.

I got on the horse and it went off by itself, running as fast as it could. I tied my hands to the horse’s reins and secured my feet in the stirrups. I had nothing to stop my bleeding and there was nothing for me in the nearby desert to aide my wound. My entire shirt was covered with blood and my head was already feeling the effects of blood lost. I didn’t think I could get back to the house awake. I had to depend on the horse to do what Simon said it could do.

I rode awake for a few minutes more before fainting. When I next opened my eyes, Mal was hauling me off the horse and I could hear Callie and Inara crying. I smiled up at Mal, who returned the smile.

“Told you I’d be back. Did we win?” I asked, barely able to move my mouth.

“You killed em all, kiddo,” he said as I fell back asleep.

* * *

I woke up next on the bed where Francis had given birth. People looked down at me from all around the bed, their faces holding expressions of worry and concern. My side had been taken care of, and I still felt weak, though not as weak as I had before. Jayne’s eyes were puffy from, what, crying?? This I didn’t believe. When I checked the faces of all the others, they were the same way.

“Is this my death bed?” I asked my voice dry.

“Nearly,” Mal said.

“You are quite a remarkable young lady,” Book said, “though I shouldn’t be surprised.”

I tried to sit up but my head swam so badly that I failed to. Simon gave me a glass of water and held my head as I drank. The others gave him some room as he moved to change my bandage. I smiled up at Jayne and held out my hand.

“Maybe I should have listened to you,” I said as he took my hand, bending down beside the bed.

“I’m kinda glad you didn’t. If you hadn’t killed Sigmunds before he got here, he would have blown the planet up. The air ships that came here were filled with enough bombs to blow us all to hell. None of us here could have done what you did. We all owe you our lives,” he said, kissing my cheek.

“I wondered what would happen with those ships. How long was I out?” I asked.

“13 hours. Callie and Wash have to do their thing this afternoon. Jayne, guys, everybody, go on about your business. Audra needs to sleep. We’ll tell her all about what happens with the Reevers after she wakes up,” Simon said, walking towards the group of people.

“Hey, Callie, come here for a second,” I said.

“What’s up?” she asked after everyone was gone.

“Just want you to know that I wish you luck. You’ll do good out there,” I said.

“Thanks. Coming from a pro,” she said and patted my hand.

“Now, go on before Simon has a hernia,” I said.

She laughed and jogged out of the room. I was left alone, looking up at the ceiling. Whatever drugs Simon had given me were beginning to work and I closed my eyes, sleep coming to me.

In my dream this time, the needle was going away from me and the buzzing was growing dimmer. I sat up on the bed and looked about the room. Where there was once had been whiteness now laid blackness. The only thing I could see was a woman lying on a bed identical to my own. She seemed older than I was, though not by much. Her skin was pale and nearly as white as her white-blond hair. From where I sat, I couldn’t tell whether she was sleeping, out cold, or dead. As I got up from my hospital bed, I felt someone grab my shoulders, gently shaking me. When he called out my name, I could swear he sounded exactly like Simon.

My eyes opened and I looked directly in front of me. Simon stood there, holding me up. “NO!! You have to let me go to her! I have to know who she is!” I screamed weakly.

“Audra, you’re sleepwalking. Wake up and get back to your bed,” Simon said.

“Come on, I’ll take her,” Jayne said.

When Simon let me go, I slumped down to the ground, having no energy whatsoever to stand on my own. Before I hit the ground, Jayne grabbed me around the waist and picked me up. I began to cry at not being able to see who the woman was, not caring who saw me cry.

“It’s okay. It’s the drugs the doc gave you,” Jayne said.

“No, Jayne, its not. I had another dream,” I said.

“Well, darlin, you’re nose ain’t bleedin. Come on, I’ll take you back to your bed and you can tell me all about it. Shhh, you’ll regret cryin later,” he said, smoothing my hair back as he carried me upstairs.

“I don’t care. I need to finish that dream,” I said, wiping the tears from my eyes.

“Dreams are best had in a bed, not walkin around, bumpin into things,” he said. Once we got to the bed, he lay me down and covered me up. I held out my hands to him and he took them. “Stay with me,” I said, calming down.

* * *

When I woke up later on, my room was dark and I felt a presence sitting in the floor beside the bed. Jayne was no longer lying beside me, so I didn’t know whom the person beside my bed could’ve been.

“Who’s there?” I asked.

“Me,” River said with her voice strong and willful, nowhere near the timid, weak sound that it normally carried.

“What can I do for you?” I asked her, sitting up. The dizziness in my head was completely gone and I wasn’t as weak as I had been earlier. “Come,” she said, taking my hand, pulling me up from the bed.

I followed her out of the room and down the stairs. We were outside and behind the house before she let go of my hands. River seemed to know that everyone would stay asleep and out of her way while she did what she had brought me back there for. I was, on the other hand, nervous. I kept looking around me, making sure we weren’t being watched. Somehow, I knew that what River had to show me wasn’t only very important. It was something that she hadn’t shown anyone else. Normally, she didn’t act this secretive and bold. Most of the time, she never was more than a few feet from Simon, her protector.

“What have you found?” I asked.

“I didn’t find this. Charlie did,” she said, bending down to pull up a rug that was covered with dust.

The light from the moon wasn’t very bright. I couldn’t tell what she had uncovered. River knew, though, from daylight excursions and expeditions, exactly what she had uncovered. She shined a light down on a stairway leading into the ground.

“Come on,” she said, motioning with both hands for me to follow her.

She walked further into the hole and I followed her. The steps were cold under my bare feet and the air in the whole was very wet. River walked boldly, further down into the whole. She seemed surer of herself than I had ever seen her to be. Charlie, apparently her friend from dinner the other day, and her had come down here often.

“What do you want me to see?” I asked, shivering from the cool, damp air.

“This,” she said and turned a bright light on. I looked around to see that I was inside an underground cave. The cave had a lake that ran through it. The lake, I could tell by all the pipes and tubes connected to it from the house, was what the planet used for water. There was enough water to kill the thirst of thousands of people.

“What the hell is this place?” I asked myself aloud.

“Where Kobi’s inhabitants get their water. This whole place is desert and this is the only water on the entire place. There’s enough water to take care of multiple planets, not just the people here. I think this is what Sigmunds was coming after, not Jeralla’s house,” River said, looking back up at me.

“Have you shown everyone else?” I asked, already knowing she hadn’t.

“No. Charlie only showed it to me recently. You see, his family used to live here. Then, when Sigmunds killed them, Jeralla came and took over the place. She took care of him. Charlie said that he knew that she doesn’t know about the water. Sigmunds wanted the water, not Jeralla’s house. This isn’t what I wanted to show you, though. What I have to show you concerns us. This that I have to show you is why Charlie let me come down here,” River said as she walked over to the far wall of the cave.

“But, doesn’t this lake run under other parts of Kobi? Why would Sigmunds want the part that Jeralla’s house is on?” I asked, following her. “Because this is the only place that has a chance of falling in on it. If these rocks fall in, the water will be cut off. What Sigmunds didn’t know, though, was that the house wasn’t doing anyone any harm. There’s no way it could fall in. Look at how much rock there is,” she said.

She reached into a crevice and pulled out a little black, stone covered book. The covers were made of black and white and had been smoothed and shaped to fit the pages like a cover. The pages were made of pink marble, with figures carved into them. The figures were ones that I recognized from my dreams. They had been on machinery, papers, the wall, and other places.

“Exactly. This is the Jreniliba language. I’m not sure what it says. I just know I’ve seen this language before. Charlie said that he found it one day in the desert and his father hid it down here. Look at this, though. It looks like a map or a diagram of some sort. Charlie said I could have it as long as I came back to visit him,” she said, blushing the last sentence. “Good for you, kiddo. Let’s take this book and give it to Simon. He’s fluent in the Jreniliba language, right?” I asked.

“What language doesn’t he know? The way I learn things, it would look like I’d know this language, too. I don’t,” she said.

“Me neither. Come on. Mal and Simon might be able to use it when we go to GroingTavelers.” River and I walked up the steps and she re-closed and recovered the whole. When we had gotten half way around the house when a gun was fired. I backed up and told River to go and hide in the cave. I grabbed the gun from the horse and motioned for the horse to be quiet. I then continued on my way to the front of the house. The five guys I’d tied up had become untied and had taken Mal, Jayne, and Zoe hostage. “Where’s the girl?” the one I’d put the knife to threatened.

“What girl?” Zoe asked.

“The one that foiled Sigmunds plans. Don’t play dumb with me, girl,” he said and hit her over the back of the head with his rifle.

Mal jumped and took his gun, shooting two of the others. Jayne shot two more. The one that had hit Zoe grabbed her and put a knife to her throat. “Now, just like you’re friend did to me. Drop your guns.”

Mal and Jayne threw their guns to the ground. I stepped behind the guy and put my gun to the back of his head, shooting him and grabbing his hand so he wouldn’t cut Zoe as he fell. “Some boys never learn, do they?” I asked the dead guy. I shouted to River that it was safe to come out.

“Good thing you don’t do what the doc tells you to do,” Zoe said, rubbing her head.

“Yeah. Really,” Mal said.

“Well, I’m not tired anymore and I’m hungry. How did Wash and Callie come out?” I asked.

“They aren’t back yet,” River said, looking out at where the Mag had been parked.

“Where’s Grease?” I asked.

There was a groan from in front of the gate. Jayne and Mal ran over to see whom it was, thinking it to be another of Sigmunds men. Mal and Jayne told River, Zoe, and I to stay where we were. Again, defying my brother, I walked over to the gate and looked down at whom they had found. Grease lay on the ground, his leg twisted around backwards and a wet patch of blood soaking his shirt. He was still alive, but barely.

“Oh, come on, man. You can’t die,” I said, bending down and looking at him. “You can’t save me this time, Audra. Lemme talk to Jayne,” he said, looking up at Jayne. “Break her heart and I’ll haunt you,” he told him weakly and turned his eyes to me. He winked. This was the last movement he ever made.

* * *

I walked back inside, the image of Grease’s face burnt to my mind. His wink would haunt me forever, and this pulled on my heart and my soul. He had only been 31 years old, too young to die. Grease had been so full of life the last time I’d seen him. I felt guilty about threatening to shoot him when he’d made fun of my lack of horsemanship skills. Knowing that there was nothing that I could do to change the past, I felt compelled to find out what had happened to him. Had the men that I’d just fought killed him?

“Audra, you should go back to bed,” River said. I looked up at her and shook my head no. “I can’t sleep with his head in my mind. Does anyone know what happened to him? Where there gunshots?” I asked as Mal came in.

“I’ve been awake for sometime, little sister. Waiting for Wash and Callie to come back. I would have heard a gunshot. These guys were very quiet when they came in. By the looks of Grease, he’d been that way for a little while,” Mal said. Jayne came in and came over to me. He put his arms around my shoulders and I put my head to his chest. One word came from his mouth. This word struck fear to the hearts of space travelers and little children. Reevers.

“How can that be?” Zoe asked, coming in behind Jayne.

“Reevers? Here? Are you sure,” Mal asked.

“The bite marks are the same. The guys…” Jayne said, his voice trailing off when he remembered me being in the room.

“His gut was burnt open and his insides were eaten. This is how a Reever operates when it’s hungry,” I said, standing up.

Outside, a dull roaring noise could be heard. The Mag and, hopefully, its pilots had returned. Mal and Zoe walked outside carefully, looking around the door for something that could attack them. I went out behind them, Jayne close by me. Wash and Callie got off the ship and Callie ran over, jumping on Mal, hugging him.

“I suppose this means all went well,” Mal said to the excited Callie.

“Oh, yeah. We did what Audra thought we could do. We tricked the ship into flying into a space rock. Bye bye, Reevers!” she said, high-fiving Wash.

Wash went over to Zoe and gave her a hug. Callie shrieked when she saw Grease’s body, making Wash and Zoe bump heads when they both jumped at the abrupt sound. My head began to swim again and I fell backwards, right into Jayne. We both landed on the ground. Mal came over to me and helped me up. I was carted back inside and to one of the front sofas, with Mal and Jayne at either side.

“You might have a problem down here with a Reever,” Wash said, sitting on another sofa with Zoe.

“Oh, yeah? Why’s that?” Mal asked.

“Well, when we first started flying at them, one of them jumped off ship in a spacesuit, parachuted down to this area of the planet, and I’m sure he made it. Is that what happened to Grease?” Wash asked.

“Looks like it. So, there was only one. Reevers live with in a pack. Are you sure there was only one?” Mal asked.

“Yeah. Well, at first there were three. I shot the other two down before the motor-ship began shooting at me. Is there anyway to make sure that the ones I shot are dead?” Wash asked. “We’ll have to ride out now. Callie, you and Jayne come with me. Zoe needs to rest her head and I want Wash to stay here with her and Audra. I’ll take the Mag, use it to spotlight on anything that may be harmful. Not going out on foot,” Mal said.

After Mal, Jayne, and Callie had been gone for a few minutes, Simon and River came downstairs. Simon had the marble book in his hand and a tired yet excited look on his face. Apparently, he’d found something in the book that was good enough to get up so early for.

“Why didn’t he let you go?” Wash asked Zoe, concern written all over his baby-like face. “Nothing to concern yourself with, really. I’ll be fine.”

Wash looked at me for an explanation. “Trust what she says. This is bad-ass Zoe we’re talking about,” I smiled. Zoe smiled, wiping the concern from Wash’s face and putting in its place a look of worry.

I got up from the couch and went towards the kitchen. “Where do you think you’re going?” Zoe asked.

“Coffee,” I said.

“No, you’re not. Let me do that for you. You need to rest,” Wash said and went past me to the kitchen.

I returned to my couch and looked across the room at Zoe. She shook her head no, no matter what it was I was going to say, she wasn’t going to take part in any of it. I shook my head yes, she should at least listen to me.

“Mal and Jayne will be fine. The only reason they took Callie was that she could fly. We’ll have a harder time disobeying Wash than Callie, you know. The thing is, that we need to have these doors locked and kept that way until we know that we’re safe. You, Audra, can’t possibly be thinking of going out there with a hole in your side that hasn’t even been able to heal any yet. No more time for adventure for you, right now anyway. Time for you and me to rest,” Zoe said, closing her eyes.

“What happened to her?” Simon asked.

“She got hit on the head really hard with that guy’s gun,” River said.

“Zoe, don’t go to sleep just yet. You might have a concussion. River, help me get her to my stuff upstairs so I can check her,” Simon said, putting the book down.

River led Zoe upstairs and I was left alone in the quiet room, waiting for Mal, Jayne, and Callie to get back. The light overhead was so bright that I began seeing spots before my eyes. An eerie feeling crept up my spine and I ran across the room to lock the door. Before I could get the door closed completely, a big gray hand reached out at me. By the smell of the hand and arm—the smell of death—I could tell that my attacker could only be one thing. The Reever jumped into the room and I screamed as I fell backwards onto the heart shaped wooden table. There were no weapons to use against a Reever in the room. In fact, all we had that could defeat a Reever, be it alone or not, was on Serendipity. My own gun was completely out of ammo and I had no other weapons to defend myself with.

Just as the Reever reached out to grab me, its head fell off. Pushing the headless body off me, I looked behind me. Standing at the top of the stairs with a round boomerang blade was River. Simon stood behind her, mouth hanging wide open.

“Thanks kiddo,” I said, saluting her.

She returned the salute and I dragged the Reevers body outside. Zoe and Wash had gotten to the room by the time I’d closed and locked the door. I picked the Reever’s head up and held it away from my body, ready to toss it out with the body. I wanted to joke with River first.

“Want to keep this as a souvenir?” I asked her. She shut her head abruptly to the left and then to the right.

“Gross, Audra. Throw that thing away,” Zoe said, sitting down on the sofa again.

I unlocked the door and threw the head out in the yard. Acting quickly, I closed the door again and locked it tight.

“What happened?” Zoe asked.

“A Reever got in. River cut its head off,” I said, sitting beside her.

Wash gave himself, Zoe, and me a cup of coffee and told Simon and River that there was more in the kitchen, should they want any. Zoe looked over at River with a look of disbelief.

“River did it? I thought you did?” she asked, turning to me.

“Nope. River saved my butt,” I said.

A loud knocking landed on the door, making everyone freeze. Wash gave Zoe a gun and I took it from her. I ran to the door and unlocked it. Pointing the door at where whoever was knocking would enter, I waited patiently.

Mal came in immediately took the gun from me. I sighed and went back to my seat beside Zoe. Jayne and Callie came in afterwards, Callie having lost what little she’d had in her stomach at the sight of the Reever and its detached head.

* * *

“So, there were no more?” I asked Jayne as he sat between Zoe and me.

“As far as we could see, no. We found the two that Wash shot down and the one that you killed. All you said was three, right?” Jayne asked Wash.

“Yeah. But Audra didn’t kill that Reever, River did,” Wash said.

Jayne looked at me with raised eyebrows. He and Zoe had had the same reaction to River’s heroism. River’s ability to use any sort of weapon didn’t surprise me at all. All I wanted to know was if the other girl in my dream had been real or thought up. Every time I looked at River, I thought about this other girl. I had no time to speculate the whys or hows of her newfound abilities.

“Well, anyway, we leave in the morning. Be up early enough to tell everyone good-bye. The quicker we get to GroingTavelers, the better,” Mal said.

With that said, everyone started going back to his or her beds. Jayne and I walked back to Serendipity and to his room. I felt that I could sleep some more, even though I’d slept the entire day and almost all night. Whatever medicine Simon had given me had worked well.

“Are you sure you’re alright?” Jayne asked me as he covered both of us up.

I burrowed my head into his pillow and put my arm around him. “Yeah. I’m fine. I’ve been out here with you and my brother for little over a week and I’m already needing a vacation.”

“Yeah. I know what you mean,” he said.

And, with that, I closed my eyes, not knowing where this ship would take me next. I knew well and good that I would have to go to GroingTavelers next and try to find out some of the truths of what had happened to River and I those months and years before. Where would I go then? Perhaps to another barren wasteland or would I go to a place where the ice and cold reigned over all good and evil alike. True, I was very tired, but I loved the adventure of it all. It was in my blood to need to be out in the open world, free as a bird and just as happy as one, too. ------------------------------------------------ Coming next: Serendipity: Rivers Wild