She nodded and he escorted her back to her quarters. River lay down on the bed in all her finery and closed her vividly painted eyelids.
“I’ll come check on you later,” Simon said. River did not answer. Maybe she was already asleep. In repose, she looked relaxed and tranquil. All the tension was drained from her face. She looked how a girl her age should look, unencumbered by cares. He kissed her lightly on the forehead and slipped out of her bunk.
As he climbed back up the ladder into the corridor Simon found himself nose to nose with Kaylee. She raised her brows and cocked her head appraisingly.
“Nice ’tache, Doc,” she said. “Makes you look more distinguished. Like a proper gentleman.”
Awkwardly, hurriedly, he rubbed away River’s handiwork with the back of his hand.
“How’s she doing?” Kaylee made as if to look around him so as to peer into his sister’s bunk.
Simon put a finger to his lips. “Asleep.” Gently he pulled the door closed and gestured for Kaylee to walk with him.
They headed back for the kitchen. Jayne was gone, and so were all the cookies. Simon glanced over his shoulder, assuring himself that there was no one within earshot, and said, “Kaylee, I know the Alliance is hounding us and all, but do you think there’s a way I could contact my parents somehow? I mean, a way that’s safe? Just to let them know River and I are alive and okay. I’ve been thinking about them, and I know I’m kind of estranged from them, but I miss them. River misses them. And maybe they miss us and are worried about us.”
Kaylee sighed and shook her head. “It’s just too risky, Simon,” she said. “The Alliance is probably monitoring your parents’ wave accounts real close in case you try to make contact. If you look into how they’re doing, the Alliance finds out how you’re doing. They’ll know for sure that you’re both still alive, and they’ll be able to triangulate which sector you’re in. Next we know, we’ll have the I.A.V. Magellan or some such looming over us, sucking Serenity in like a bug into a vacuum cleaner.” She pulled a sad face. “Sorry.”
“No, it’s fine. Just thought I’d ask. Should have known it wasn’t possible.”
“You just have to accept that you and River are your only family for now. Well,” Kaylee added, “and us too. The crew, I mean. All of us. Not just me. I’m not saying I’m your family. Perish the thought. ’Cause that would sound like we’re, y’know, related, and we’re not related, and that’s good, real good, since us not being related means…”
She was flustered. She seemed to have got herself all tangled up in her own words.
“I’ll stop talking,” she said.
Simon looked at her. Kaylee was the kindest, sweetest person he had ever met, and she, more than anyone else in the crew, was doing her darnedest to make him feel at home aboard Serenity. Not only that but sometimes, the way her eyes flashed when she looked at him, he got the sense that she was trying to tell him something about herself. She was sending him a coded message which he couldn’t quite interpret correctly.
She reached over and touched his upper lip. “Missed a bit,” she said. “Just there.”
Self-consciously he wiped away the last smudge of charcoal.
“There,” Kaylee said. “Now you look like the Simon we all know and… like.”
And with that, she trotted off back to the engine room, leaving Simon nonplussed but the kind of nonplussed that felt good. He put a fingertip back to where she had touched him, and for a brief while he forgot about his parents, about River, about the Alliance, and was consumed instead with thoughts of this wonderful, baffling young woman with the thick chestnut hair and hazel eyes and quirky smile who loved his sister almost as unconditionally as he did and who enjoyed teasing him and who would let him kiss her, he was sure, if only he could summon up the nerve to do so.
14
It had been a long time since Book had piloted a shuttle, and it felt both odd and good to be in the driver’s seat. On Serenity he often served in what some might consider a passive capacity — as an observer, counselor, and father confessor, roles he had embraced willingly at Southdown Abbey and fulfilled on the ship in a somewhat more secular manner. He also prayed for everyone aboard, something Inara, when she’d found out about it, had advised him to conceal from the captain.
To a true believer such as Book, prayer was as active a pursuit as shooting a gun or repairing an engine. But for Mal Reynolds it was a reminder that, to his way of thinking, God had deserted him and all the people he had fought for, and would have willingly died for, during the most crucial part of the war. Believers, in Mal’s view, were deluded fools, and he made no secret of the fact.
It signified a profound loss of faith, and Book was very sorry for it. He was sorrier still that Mal was denied that source of strength and comfort in the trying times they lived in. The burdens the captain carried were heavy indeed.
As Book guided the shuttle into a slow, careful descent to Eavesdown Docks, he beseeched the Lord to protect the crew and the captain, and for a successful outcome to his mission. He added a sincere plea to soften Mal’s heart and to help him find a way back to the comforts of belief.
At least part of his prayer was answered as he completed his landing maneuvers at Guilder’s. The shipwrights seemed to buy his explanation that the missing shuttle was the result of a “family matter” and that that was why the authorities were not being called in. His clerical collar often eased his way, much as Inara’s status as a Registered Companion did for her. He knew Inara had some history, as did he — and like him, she kept her past to herself. He had always wondered why, if she had loved her home planet so much, she had left it. Had she done so willingly or had she been pressured to leave? He pondered on occasion if anyone was actively searching for her in the way that the Alliance was looking for the Tams. He would never bring it up — everyone had enough to worry about, and he wouldn’t want to put Inara on the spot — but he did cast a watchful eye on the waves and bulletins they received. When they spent time planetside, he stayed alert in case she might need assistance, but so far he hadn’t detected anything that could validate his concern.
He left the shuttle with his satchel slung on his back. Inside were a few toiletries, some coin, and a high-tech stun gun and a charger for it. Some of the money came from Mal, a cut of the profits from previous jobs, which the captain distributed among the crew in accordance with the traditional pirate custom of sharing spoils, and Book had supplemented the sum with cash of his own. He might have taken a vow of poverty, but it was difficult to bribe people for information just by appealing to their better natures.
“Hey, Shepherd,” Wash said through his comm link. “You down safe and sound?”
“That I am,” Book replied.
“You’re gonna find Mal, right?”
“If providence is on my side, yes.”
“When would providence not be on a Shepherd’s side?”
“Quite. Now you get that Firefly to Aberdeen in one piece, you hear me, Wash? And everyone on board, too. I’ll be praying for you.”
“Amen to that,” said Wash. “Be careful, Shepherd.”
“Never knowingly not.”
Ending the call, Book walked along the perimeter of the bustling, chaotic docks. Overhead, one of Persephone’s two moons, Renao, was riding high and bright. Its smaller counterpart, Hades, had yet to rise.
He found himself studying the sides of buildings and spacecraft wreckage for anything that might help him solve the mystery of their missing captain. Mika Wong would likelier than not prove useful in that regard, but Book was loath to call upon his old friend unless it was unavoidable. When mentioning Wong to the crew, he had shaded the true nature of their association. He knew his shipmates wondered about his past, but there was no benefit to be gained on either side by full disclosure, as yet. The time might come when Book could share his life story with them — a reverse confession, if you will; a preacher shriving himself of his sins to the members of the laity. Until then, his past and all its uncomfortable truths were better left buried.