Serenity had been circling Aeetes for three days. Aeetes was the large uninhabitable planet that Medea and its twin moon Absyrtis orbited. Mal had decided that staying on the far side of Aeetes was best for now. He hadn’t been too sure how connected these folks were to the Alliance, or what kind of ships they might have of their own, but either way he wanted to stay out of sight. More then anything he knew he had to make Dennly believe Serenity had left for good.

The original plan had been for Mal and Jayne to take the shuttle to Medea, land near enough to Eden Station, and case the place for a few days. They needed to learn the routines surrounding the place and most importantly they needed to be certain Wash was alive. They had to set eyes on him.

Abruptly the plan had changed.

Zoë had been livid. While she didn’t voice her opinion in front of the rest of the crew the very moment she had Mal alone she let him have it. There was no way a landing party was forming without her on it. Period.

Mal had tried to get her to see reason; he couldn’t very well leave Jayne in charge of the ship. Doing that was an open invitation to trouble. She really had no counter to that, as it was true enough. Times before when they’d left the ship together Wash had been there to ensure they’d have a ship to return too. Now he wasn’t. She just said they’d have to trust Jayne. That and Kaylee could always kill the engines if he tried anything funny.

Mal still hadn’t been convinced. He was beginning to fathom that her feelings for Wash must run a bit deeper then he’d hoped, especially if she was causing such a ruckus to be apart of the survey team. And it was largely because of that he had pushed back harder for her not go. He didn’t want her there if they did find out he’d been wrong and Wash was dead. He was trying to spare her, but she wasn’t having it.

Finally, after an hours worth of arguing she’d grown silent and turned away from him. He thought it was over then he just managed to hear her say, “I have to know Mal. I can’t just wait here not knowing.”

Her voice was edgy and raw and it had wavered. No calling him ‘Sir’. No calling him ‘Captain’. She’d been pleading with him as a friend. There was nothing more he could do.

“We’ll leave in an hour.”

She had nodded and neither of them spoke of it again.

Three days later they were still surveying the place with no sign of Wash.

At first they both had been optimistic and the first day had gone quickly. They’d found it easier to monitor Eden Station then they could have hoped for. Mal and Zoë had set up a rough camp in the surrounding foothills and took turns watching it from a distance through the ships one pair of laser binoculars.

Neither had expected to spot him right off. They were able to tell that Eden Station wasn’t nearly as well manned as they had first thought. It was roughly thirty people who looked like they were a regular part of the outfit or hired hands. Out of them roughly ten or so looked to be running things, this included Adrienne Lee who they saw quite frequently, Dennly who showed up at least once a day, Dr. Kellerman and an older Chinese man who looked like he was in charge of the shuttle dock and adjoining cargo bay. Aside from the hired hands there were also between forty to fifty people working in the surrounding fields that were almost certainly being held against their will.

Eden Station appeared to have only one cargo shuttle that made three daily trips and judging by the sloppy take-offs and landings it was most definitely not being piloted by Wash.

At the start of the second day Zoë still tried to remain hopeful. Inside her mind was turmoil. She knew part of her wanted to be here searching because she felt guilty. When Dennly had told them Wash was dead she’d been certain that she was the reason. She’d missed part of the parasite and he’d died because of it.

Zoë had seen death before. Had been there and watched it drain the life from young men and women and had not been able to stop it, but this had been different. She couldn’t pin point why this had been so personal to her, couldn’t account for the feeling it stirred at the time, but mostly there had been shock. She had been in shock until Mal had told them all that he thought Wash was alive and then the feelings became clearer.

There was something special between the two of them that was almost intangible. Something not quite defined yet, but on the verge of being. Without realizing it, each day the feelings she had for him had grown; with each talk, each moment together they’d become closer to each other. It had all felt so easy and natural and had all hurt so horribly when she thought it had been lost for good.

It might never amount to anything more significant then one night together, but she had to know. More then anything, she wanted to know. She felt a connection to Wash and felt compelled to see what would become of it.

So as the second day ended with still nothing significant to report Zoë felt the pain of that loss creeping back into her system. Mal tried to remain positive, but she could read his face. All to clearly he’d thought that if they were going to see him alive they would have by now. He managed to get closer to the station that day while Zoë had continued to sweep the site. The buildings, four apart from the bay, were mainly empty. The only ones that had occupants during the daytime were the mess, which held five cooks, and the laboratories, which he could glimpse from the outside held about ten technicians. The possibility that Wash was still sick stuck in his head, but there was no way to enter the infirmary and confirm that without being seen.

Zoë had been quiet that night. The next evening they were scheduled to rendezvous back at Serenity with the remainder of the crew. As before they took turns keeping watch in the night, but neither of them really slept.

At the start of the third day they thought there was new reason to hope. The shuttle, which had normally departed at 0630 on both days previous, did not take off.

Eagerly they had watched the cargo bay for the next several hours, and aside from the usual activity in the fields, they saw nothing more significant then a minor skirmish amongst one of the field workers and one of the heads. The shuttle failing to leave turned out to be nothing more then what looked like a broken part.

“Zoë,” Mal finally said at the end of the day as the field hands began to head in, “we should be headed back.”

She said nothing but continued scanning the cargo bay and surrounding areas.

“He’s probably held up in the infirmary is all.”

Zoë was still looking.

“We’ll come back tomorrow evening and set up…”

“There,” she said hurriedly cutting him off and pointing out towards the bay, “that’s him.”

Mal took the binoculars from her to see for himself, not certain he believed it.

“About twelve back in the line headed inside,” she told him as he scanned around.

It had taken a minute for Mal to find the individual Zoë had pointed out and another minute to recognize him as Wash. His hair had been cropped much too short and he was covered from head to toe in dirt. Aside from that he also had a nasty black eye and looked a bit too short to be Wash, but Mal soon noticed it was because he was walking with a definite crick in his back and was partly hunched over. By the time the man reached the door Mal had been positive too. It was Wash. Zoë and him had spent so much of their time searching the cargo bay and surrounding area without ever having paid attention to the people working in the fields. And that’s where he’d been, probably the whole time they’d been looking. Judging from the shiner he had been the person they’d seen in the fight that very morning.

Mal felt a bit guilty about it. It hadn’t really occurred to him that Wash would be doing anything other then piloting; it hadn’t occurred to him that Wash would refuse to fly. No one would go out of there way to snatch a skilled worker and have them hefting cargo and digging ditches. He hadn’t given a thought about him doing it, but Wash must have told them off. It kind of made Mal feel a bit guilty because he should have realized Wash had too much pride to work for a scumbag like Dennly.

“That’s him alright,” Mal finally acknowledged with a bit of a smile on his face as he set down the binoculars.

After a moment’s reflection, the smile faded. Mal hoped Wash didn’t have so much pride that he got himself killed.

****

Wash set down heavily at the table for dinner. He was exhausted and was really too tired to eat. He’d never been above working hard but this was down right ridiculous. All day long from sun up to sun down he was in fields harvesting, planting, weeding, you name it they were doing it. They only stopped three times for breaks, all of which were short. They, of course, were him and his fellow prisoners. At first he thought it might not be too bad because at least he had company, except not a one spoke English but himself. The majority spoke Chinese and Wash knew some Chinese, but seeing as it was mostly swears, he couldn’t really hold decent conversations with anyone.

That might have been the hardest part; he had no one to talk too. Lee had tried to talk with him the first couple of nights after he discovered what kind of ‘arrangement’ had been made for him here, but he would have none of that. That very morning she’d tried to persuade him to help fix the shuttle, which their current pilot, a real amateur, had overloaded a thruster on. Lee had said that doing it would show Dennly he wasn’t quite so hard headed and might make leaving Eden Station easier. It was an easy fix and wouldn’t have taken more then an hour, but he wouldn’t do it. She’d persisted and he’d told her where she could stick her shuttle and that’s when the head guy they called Chang had socked him in the eye. Didn’t hurt much anymore, he just wished he could have hit him back but he had been swarmed before he had the chance.

Wash got up and tossed his untouched dinner in the trash before heading up to his bunk. The only bright spot of this whole thing was that he had his own room. No wait, it was a cell. There was no bright spot, this was a nightmare.

He never thought Lee would have sold him out like this. Or that Mal and the others would have just left him like this. Dennly and his cronies were going to keep him here until he died of exhaustion and no one would care. Lee had certainly picked the right man for the job; no family and no friends to speak of. He was theirs now.

As he lay on his bed, to tired to clean up or even change out of his filthy dust covered clothes he heard the audible click of the door locking him in followed shortly by another click coming from his wrist.

That damn bracelet. Eden Station’s insurance.

Wash’s first idea had been to run for it. As soon as he comprehended what was going on he knew he’d just have to find his way out. He hadn’t counted on their insurance policy.

That metal bracelet was the first thing they’d attached to him after leaving Dennly’s office. It was simple really. They attached it to his wrist and it had lit up with a green light. Then they explained it to him. All around Eden Station’s perimeter were monitors. These monitors synced up with the bracelets. If someone happened to wander off of Eden Station wearing one of these bracelets the light would go red and after three minutes the whole thing would detonate.

Wash hadn’t liked the sound of that. He was a pilot after all and pilots needed both their hands to do their job.

Then after a few days of fieldwork Wash began to rethink that. Did he really need both hands to steer? Not really. He could fly with one arm.

The next day he saw the only one armed man in the place with one of those bracelets around his neck and all thoughts of conventional escape left Wash’s head in a hurry.

For the time being he was theirs. He didn’t like it and was sure to let them know that every chance he got, black eye or not, but he could wait it out. He’d work where he had too, but never where they wanted him too. He didn’t look it but Wash was a patient man. He wasn’t always a well thought out or a well-organized man, but he could be patient. After all, he’d waited patiently for nearly a year to get close to Zoë…

That thought hurt.

Wash rubbed his face and tried hard not to think it again, but he couldn’t help himself. Zoë and him…. well, there was no Zoë and him. And now there never would be.

That’s what probably hurt the most. He’d gotten so close. Cared about her so much and now she was gone. Mal had likely told her by now about what Wash had let slip out during their last argument, something about him being a cadet in the academy, and Zoë was now probably relieved nothing had ever happened between them. It was all a misunderstanding, he hadn’t gotten out the whole of it to Mal before the fever had taken him, but it didn’t matter now.

He just wished he had one memory of a kiss Zoë and him had shared to hold on to. Hell, he’d never even gotten the nerve up to hold her hand and it was a shame. Now the memory of what might have been would have to be good enough to sustain him.

He thought about it despite himself. He thought about her.

It was all he had left.