F: Brought to the Edge and Always Crossing the Lines (2/4)
Fandom: Firefly
Main characters: Simon, River, Mal, Kaylee, Zoe, Tracey, Jayne, Inara, Book, Wash, OCs
Referenced characters: Simon's parents
Pairings: Implied Tracey/Kaylee (and Simon/River depending on your interpretation; it's not what I intended)
Contains: Angst, AU, violence
Rating: PG13
Summary: Simon began by searching for someone to help him save River. When he failed to save her, he decided he would go to any lengths to get a second chance. In the course of things, he finds himself on Serenity anyway. He is not particularly welcome, but that doesn't matter. Only River matters.
Notes: This is my
firefly_bigbang! Let's pretend I haven't cocked up a million times in the course of this! Thank you primarily to feywood, for the beta and the encouragement; thank you also to auroraprimavera for the encouragement. Thank you,
yvi, for being so patient with my cock-ups! ♥ Title from Seth Lakeman's song, Circle Grows. Split into parts merely because it's too long for LJ to handle.
Art: Here.
Part I | Part II | Part III | Part IV
Simon had been with the resistance for five days. He didn't feel ready. He didn't feel as if he'd learnt anything, not anything that stuck -- he felt slower, stupider, adapting to a whole new kind of life. There was a woman who'd taught him some tricks, as she put it, and she called him as quick as he was pretty, but he didn't feel it. There was so much to think about. Ways to dodge the feds, the kind of places you could hide, passwords, a few little moves that might get him out of some trouble, some day...
He didn't feel as if he was cut out for this, at all. He was wearing his old clothes -- the cheap suit was unbearable -- and he felt he stuck out like a sore thumb, again, everywhere, far too fancy and aloof. He didn't mean to be, he just was, same as he'd been down on the streets.
But she'd called him quick, and apparently her opinion counted for something, counted more than his. The boss had decided it was time to speak to him, time to tell him what was what. Had decided, apparently, that he was going to play a fairly major part in what was going to happen.
"Any longer, and they're going to really start missin' you," the leader said, looking at him hard. Simon could never tell if this was the voice he'd heard on the phone. It sounded different, sharper, harsher, and yet there was something in the tone that was just the same. Something that stung, a goad. "You ready for this?"
He said yes. Of course he did.
"They're looking for you now, but they haven't really thought about your sister. They wouldn't, it's not something they'd expect a man to do, go running around after his sister like this... You're brave, at least." The man said it as if he knew that Simon was really petrified, on the inside. There was just that mocking hint about his face. But it softened, just a little. "Better than some city boys I've known. They wouldn't piss on their own mother if she was on fire, if the Alliance said it was unsanitary. You're a mite better than that. The girl you saved -- " for a moment, Simon couldn't even remember it, caught almost off-balance, and then he did, remembered that struggling pulse and the brittle body under his hands -- "she was my cousin's kid. You might live in the lap of luxury, but you do still have some human decency."
"I'm a doctor. I'm meant to help people. That's the reason I became a doctor in the first place."
"D'you know how many doctors really believe that?"
"All of them, I hope."
"You know they don't. They're meant to help people as long as they're getting paid, they think. Isn't that right?"
Simon didn't say anything.
"But you're different, anyway. I don't think you're ready for this, I don't know if you can do it -- "
"You haven't even told me what it is, yet," Simon said, quietly. It made him sound almost confident, assured, as if he actually thought it might be something he could do, after all. He didn't feel like that, not at all. He felt a little sick, actually.
"We're going to give you a little time to practice, of course. There'll be the trip to where she's been taken... Alright, then. I suppose it is time to tell you."
He had diagrams. He had passwords. He had a uniform. He had a getaway plan, he had fake identification, he had lists, he had names... Simon tried to take it all in, but had time for one main thought -- the uniform, he could manage the uniform, he could speak as clipped and precise as anyone, act out his part better than he could have dreamed. Maybe it was the only role he could have played, the only way he could possibly have fit in at all.
"The list of ships," one of them said, touching Simon's arm: it wasn't the leader, but one of the others, someone Simon had seen around a couple of times, even in his short time there. "If you can, look out for Serenity. If you have chance. You probably won't, you'll be running so hard, but... Serenity's not a bad boat. She don't look like much, but they got a decent mechanic on board, and the captain... he's not a bad sort. He's a Browncoat, fought in the battle of Serenity Valley. My brother fought with him. He'll do right by you. He'll do right by anyone who lets him get one up on the Alliance. And there's always Zoe. She's his second in command. She fought on for a while, after the war ended, was a whole heap of trouble the Alliance never quite managed to clean up. She'll help you, if you tell her the truth. And they might be on Persephone at the right time."
"Thanks," Simon said, more awkward than ever, without pointing out that there was a lot of maybe in all of that. It was help, an offering, and he'd take it. He'd have to take it -- that was one of the things he had to rely upon now. Or he would after this: this was a kind of point of no return. After this, he'd have nothing. Even now, he realised, he could turn back.
He could, if he was an asshole, if he was complicit, if he was a blank-faced jerk or some ignorant little rich boy. He could if he could forget River, and he knew he couldn't do that.
"Good luck," the man said, and this time he had a wry look about him, that said louder than words -- I think you'll need it.
And Simon tried to smile, tried to joke, voiced the thought: "I'll need it."
There was a kind of sympathy, then, and that was almost worse.
---
He was shot.
He managed to ascertain that much through a sudden heavy dizziness. He wondered if it was blood loss, but thought it more likely to be shock. His fingers found the entry wound, traced around it. There was a curious lack of pain, his thoughts slow and thick like they came through a layer of cotton wool, blurred and blunted. He knew where he was, he was in the Academy. Or in the complex where they experimented on his sister, anyway. Not necessarily the school she had originally gone to, after all. Perhaps that wasn't even likely. He couldn't remember if they had told him, or not. He suspected not: they hadn't told him very much, had they?
Nobody had ever told him it would feel like this. He thought he could feel the bullet inside him, despite the lack of pain, and he knew he was making pained noises, that blood was slick on his fingers, dripping onto the floor. He didn't seem to be able to do anything about it. But then he couldn't anyway, he'd never tried to operate on himself, that'd be crazy.
He realised that he might have to, and groaned as his head swam. His ears seemed packed with cotton wool, too. The whole of him. Cushioned. The brain's response to a situation it can't handle.
He could see River. She was lying on her back, some devices strapped to her, people gathered round her. They weren't even looking at him. He supposed he didn't matter so very much. He clearly posed no threat. But River -- he saw her body jerk, convulse, saw her mouth open and thought she might be screaming, too.
"River," he whispered.
He thought he could hear some sort of alarm, as well. It was making his ears ring, despite the cotton wool. There didn't seem to be much he could do. He tried to move, to raise himself up -- to get closer to River. But it hurt so much. It hurt so much. Funny kind of prince he made. Couldn't even lift a hand to save the princess, let alone fight the dragon or the evil witch or the evil witch who'd turned herself into a dragon, whatever the story had been. Couldn't hack through the hedge of thorns.
He thought someone was screaming his name, and that had to be River, but he couldn't get the energy to respond, to even lift his head, now. He imagined the warm dark pool of his blood on the cold floors, the way he must look -- almost like a soldier, but that was ridiculous, because he'd never fight. He couldn't fight. He would, for River, if he could, but he couldn't remember even holding a gun. And now he'd been shot by one...
Then there were hands on him, rough hands, hauling him to his feet, and he tried to fight because they were taking him away from River. But then he managed to focus, knew she was already gone, and there was a voice in his ear, gruff but warm, penetrating through the sticky cocoon of shock. "Quit fightin', boy, we're here to get you out."
"I'm hardly an asset," Simon said, but he stopped fighting, of course. He was coherent, outside of his own head. The words seemed to come out clear, anyway, and they seemed to be understood well enough. "Why would you -- "
"You could tell 'em about us," the man said, holding him tightly, half-carrying and half-dragging him. "And you're a doctor, ain't you? We need more doctors."
It was hard to speak, but it seemed important to hang on to life, to say something. "Of course. Self-interest."
"You can say that once we've got that bullet outta you."
Then the man was pushing him through a door, and people were laying hold of him, pushing and pulling him to lie down on a make-shift bed. Simon rests his head on the cool metal, tries not to think about the blood undoubtedly puddling beneath him already. He can feel the surge and ebb of his own blood. "Alright," he said, distantly, "I will."
The man looked down at him. Simon couldn't place his face at all, and he seemed to be getting further away all the time, but Simon thought they might be safe now, and that helped. "Tougher than I thought," the man said, but he probably wasn't speaking to Simon, and Simon was beyond any kind of reply in any case. Unconsciousness was warm and thick and black, and he knew no more.
---
There was blood slicking his hands again, but it wasn't his own. That was, at least, a good thing. Simon was used to high pressure but this --
"Get down," someone hissed, and he was about to snap or protest, but she was right, after all. He got down lower to the ground and crawled forward, dragging his latest patient with him awkwardly. She reached out and grabbed the other arm, yanking the injured man forward and behind some large crates. "I'll take care of him from here. Can he walk?"
"He'll need support, but he can walk a little. He has to."
"Right, doc," she said. She peeked over the top of the crates, firing a few shots. "Jack's been shot. Just his arm."
"Where is he?"
The woman raised her head over the barrier, fired again, then ducked behind, grabbing the unconscious man by the arms and hauling him backwards. "Over there," she said, nodding, and then it was like Simon didn't exist any more -- she was focusing back on the battle, on the blood and the guns. Simon crawled forward, his heart in his mouth.
"Doc," someone said, almost whispering compared to the noise of the guns and the cries of pain, and Simon crawled towards them, keeping his head down. "I'll cover you. You need to go help Smith."
"I heard -- "
"Smith's nearest. And I can cover you."
"Alright," Simon said, his heart sinking. When he'd agreed to do this -- he hadn't thought it'd be like this. This desperate. He should've known, should've thought... There'd always been a kind of glamour in the idea of a resistance, and the hint of a delicious fairytale. He and River had always played about it, half-romanticised it. There'd been mud and blood in their visions, but not this. Not quite this. He took a deep breath and rose to a half-crouch, ready to run for the next available cover.
"Now, doc," they said, whoever they were, and Simon went, tripping up and landing in a puddle, but safe. Not even grazed, this time.
Smith was pale and sweating, bleeding out. They were perilously close to the guns, there where he'd fallen, and Simon kept his head lower than ever. He couldn't help looking around, checking for some kind of weapon, some way to defend himself or escape... Smith's gun was right beside him, half under his body, glinting cold and steel. Simon took it, closing his hand around it, drew it out from under the man -- ignoring , and then he got to work.
He'd thought it was bad, working a hospital. Seeing little ones hurt, parents and grandparents looking to him for surety and reassurance, and him grim and tired and wordless from the fight with death. Seeing people turned almost inside out by accidents, by carelessness, and seeing their families tearing themselves apart too, as if they have to match. But the battlefield -- that was worse, that was raw. Simon could not truly give the man ease, and though his hands were steady, always steady, they were not gentle. He searched for the wounds, bandaged the man quickly, roughly, slip-shod -- work he'd have been ashamed of, before. Now he knows what's more important, though, and that's the minutes, hours, days, he might earn for this man.
He didn't know, afterwards, what had made him look up, or what instinct had made him reach for the gun. What instinct had made him bring the gun close in the first place. But his hand closed on it, brought it up just in time, without any time to mourn the necessity, the breaking of this rule --
The man fell with a shout, and Simon took a deep sharp breath and tried not to just drop the gun. "Stay there," he said, to the fallen man. He was in the colours of the other side -- clearly from the other side anyway, with his clean-shaven face and comparatively neat and clean clothes, with the neat bandage on his arm. "It's not serious. I'll deal with you once I've seen to our own."
"You're an odd one," someone said, at his elbow, but they were smiling and he, too, was smiling. Because this made a difference, made them different, gave one man a story to take back about decency and generosity.
They were laughing, teasing, and he smiled too.
---
The new recruits were full of energy, jittering, not yet learning the quiet patience of the older ones, the ones who'd been in this a while. Simon felt old, looking at them, even though he thought this one or that might have been older than him. They seemed fresh, somehow, naive. Simon yearned towards that, not yet hardened enough to have lost all the idealism, the shine.
"You got any family?" one of them asked. He was younger, perhaps not even twenty years of age yet, and his face was warm and open, ready to laugh. He was asking one of the veterans, but the man just gave him a look, as if to say, we don't ask that here. Simon cleared his throat.
"I have, I suppose. I was disowned by my parents, and my sister... she's why I fight."
"She killed?" the boy said, seeming at once disgusted and eager, ready to hear the worst of the Alliance. "Denied care?"
"Worse," Simon said, simply, but he could see the boy couldn't imagine worse, couldn't imagine his way out of the slums and dirt. "She's alive."
"Don't that mean you can at least rescue her?"
"I hope so. That's part of the reason why I'm here, after all."
He thought no one had been listening, but he didn't think it was a coincidence when one of the men got up and left the room. He couldn't quite remember who it had been, but it wasn't a face he recognised -- not one that he came into contact with every day.
He tried to conceal the hope on his face. Maybe, maybe this time. Maybe.
---
Simon never knew what he'd expected would happen when someone finally offered him another chance. He knew it'd be something big -- that he'd have had to do something big to earn it, because he'd failed them once before. He hadn't expected to be called into what looked like an old-style war room -- maps and terminals, people leaning over them and making marks, talking in low, serious voices. He wondered if this was new: there certainly hadn't been anything like this back when he was first a member. But then, he hadn't been trusted then.
People trusted him now. Most of them had found it necessary to trust him once or twice, and some people -- the ones who saw the most action, usually, because the simply clumsy ones ended up dead or deserting -- had been under his knife enough that he'd lost count.
He found it almost a surprise when he recognised every single face in the room.
"Doctor Tam," one of them said, straightening up when she saw him.
"Simon," he said, nodding slightly. "Hello, Jane."
"I'm surprised you recognised me, with how many patients you have."
"I've operated on you often enough."
She smiled, wryly. "There's that. Did you know I was..."
"One of the leaders? No. It's been a long time since I had anything direct from one of you."
"We didn't forget you," she said, putting a hand on his arm. "In fact, we've had our eye on you, and on your sister. It hasn't been easy, in her case, but we felt it was something we should take a special interest in. And my own sister is one of her... peers."
"I'm sorry."
"So am I," she said, grimacing a little, but then she shook her head. "There's something you should see. How much you were told about what was happening to your sister?"
"Experiments. Messing with her brain... Not much, honestly. And I didn't see much, during my attempt. I spent the first half of it pretending to be an ice-cold bastard, and the latter half trying not to bleed quite so much."
"You made quite a determined effort at dying. I was one of the rescue team."
Simon hesitated, looking at her face quickly and then away. "Your sister -- "
"I knew it wouldn't do any good. I didn't even see her." Jane shook her head. "But we don't have that much time. There's a meeting in here soon, I think, and I'm supposed to get this over with before then. Come on. Let's go and sit down in the quiet." She was already leading him to a connecting room, smaller, with just a couple of terminals and hard little seats. "It's not very comfortable, but... none of this is going to be comfortable. Sit down, here."
"What are you going to show me?"
"It's... your sister. You'll understand why she's a particular concern of ours." Jane didn't quite look at him. She brought up a video with a few quick movements and then stood up, leaving him alone with it.
He knew River immediately. Her hair was shorter, and she moved differently now -- graceful, more graceful than ever, but different. Still, he knew her -- the shape of her body, the quickness of her movements, always darting and quick. And her face, even though he saw barely a sliver of it, like a pale new moon. There seemed to be no expression on her face, but there were knives in her hands, bright and sharp. Simon twisted sharply, looking up at Jane, but she was turned away. He looked back quickly, knowing he shouldn't miss a moment, that there might not be a second chance to see it.
"You can watch it in your own time if you want," she said, as if she knew his thoughts. "But I don't think you'll want to."
The image flickered and changed. This time he saw River's face, and knew for sure that there was no expression. It was River, and yet not. Her mouth was set in a familiar line, her jaw tight, but her eyes were somehow blank, focused inward. She tilted her head for a moment as if listening, and Simon bit his lip as she darted suddenly up, up a wall that he knew he could not have climbed, hiding as someone came along the corridor. She seemed to almost melt out of sight, almost inhuman.
He watched when she dropped down lightly, knives in her hands again, and stole along the corridor. The image flickered again, showing something different -- a room, softly lit, a bedroom. There was a man on the bed, asleep, hair rumpled and body sprawled out.
The door opened.
"She's -- "
"Just watch," Jane said, quietly.
"Is she going to -- ?"
"Watch."
Simon looked back again. River was just entering the room. The door closed behind her, silently, and then he saw her moving up to the bed.
He couldn't watch, when she struck, quick as a snake, her expression unchanging. He opened his eyes again in time to see the blood-soaked bed, and River leaving the room.
"She's become an assassin," Jane said, softly. She turned again, putting her hand on Simon's shoulder. "Do you still want to rescue her?"
Simon looked at her and remembered her as she should have been. Smiling, laughing, dancing. Gentle. Not this silent deadly thing. "What have they done to her? She was never... She could never have done this."
"You know what they were doing. Playing with her brain. Playing with her. Brainwashing her."
"I do want this recording," Simon said, after a moment. His hands were pressed to his knees, as if he needed to force them still. He took a deep breath. "And I'll do anything to... to bring her back, to save her."
"What if she can't be saved?"
"I have to try." He hesitated. "Anything you get, of her. I don't know how you got this, but. If you can. Can I have it?"
"You're her brother," Jane said. "Of course. But it will be like this. They keep her on a tight rein except when they're using her. There won't be anything else."
He looked once more at the last still image, the bloody bed, and the door open where River had left the scene. "I have always taken River just as she was."
"This is different, though."
"I'm her brother." Simon clenched his fists hard, nails digging into his palms, deep and yet not deep enough. His jaw was clenched, and Jane thought he was shaking -- shaking with anger. "I'll save you," he said, but not to her, to the recording, to the blood-soaked bed. "I'll save you. Hold on, River."
Then he laughed, and perhaps that was the worst part, the bitter dark sound. It didn't sound as if it helped.
"Thank you," he said, getting up. "Let me know when you know what I can do. When there's some kind of plan."
"You probably won't like it."
"I don't like any of this."
---
Primum non nocere. Once it used to be the most important thing. First, do no harm.
He thought he would always hold to that, he thought there could never be anything that overrode it. But then he thought about River -- warmth and life as a child, never still, always running and moving, like her namesake, never still. And he thought about the glimpse of her he'd caught, tortured and pinned down, like a rare butterfly on cardboard. The way he seemed to remember her calling out his name -- and suddenly everything was easier. First there was an anger in him, that heated and moved him, prevented him from hesitating at the last moment. He knew that the people he shot probably had little to do with River, but they were all part of it. And then there was the knowledge that every step might take him closer, so every step was a hundred times more important. Every movement, every breath -- his breath, or those of the man he was supposed to kill.
It became easy. He got the guns ready, adjusted the sights, lay still in position and watched, waited for his moment. He became shockingly good at it. It was like an operation, in some ways, he told himself. You have to make sure everything is just right, first -- not just physically, but in the patient's mind, you have to know they understand, you have to know they know what you have to do and that they agree. It was more violent, though mostly not more bloody; it was so much bigger and yet further away and yet -- if he could think of it like excising a tumour --
But no. He still knew what it was. It was harm, it was death, and it didn't matter if it's for the greater good -- he had to know, remember, that the lives he took then would impact so many other lives.
That's what made it better than what they do. Because they didn't know what they do, or they didn't care, cutting River right out of the heart of her family, taking her for themselves, taking away the brightness and warmth of her that he always knew was there, like the sun.
First, do no harm. He could at least remember that, hold that in mind. Even if he couldn't hold to it.
---
It didn't take long for there to be more videos. Now they had her, Simon thought, they couldn't resist using her. It was noticed, even noted in the news sources that were generally Alliance-friendly. How the enemies of the Alliance were dying out like flies.
It didn't take a genius, although Simon was one, to imagine what the leaders of the resistance were thinking. River was more than just some object of pity, now. She had to be a priority, because they had to get her before she got them. Eventually the Alliance, or whoever held her leash, would work their way down the list to the leaders of the resistance.
Simon wondered for a moment what would happen to River when all the current enemies had conveniently disappeared, but it didn't take a genius to work that out, either. There'd always be some enemy. Someone would get hold of her and use her on the Alliance itself, perhaps, emptying it from the inside to facilitate a quick move up. If the resistance got hold of her --
Simon had always liked to think the best of people.
He'd seen the awe, though, as well as the fear, in the eyes of Jane and those like her. He'd seen the calculations going on behind their eyes. What they'd do with such a weapon if they could lay hand to it.
He looked down at his own hands, the growing callouses, the way they seemed to shape themselves ready to fit a gun. He looked at the gun not a metre away from him, laying ready and deadly. The opening at the end of the barrel looked almost like an eye, looking at him. He looked away.
"Both of us, River, huh? Just tools."
He gets up, turning off the recordings. He picks up his gun belt, his gun.
"I will save you," he said, but it wasn't clear who he was saying it to.
Part I | Part II | Part III | Part IV
Main characters: Simon, River, Mal, Kaylee, Zoe, Tracey, Jayne, Inara, Book, Wash, OCs
Referenced characters: Simon's parents
Pairings: Implied Tracey/Kaylee (and Simon/River depending on your interpretation; it's not what I intended)
Contains: Angst, AU, violence
Rating: PG13
Summary: Simon began by searching for someone to help him save River. When he failed to save her, he decided he would go to any lengths to get a second chance. In the course of things, he finds himself on Serenity anyway. He is not particularly welcome, but that doesn't matter. Only River matters.
Notes: This is my
firefly_bigbang! Let's pretend I haven't cocked up a million times in the course of this! Thank you primarily to feywood, for the beta and the encouragement; thank you also to auroraprimavera for the encouragement. Thank you,
yvi, for being so patient with my cock-ups! ♥ Title from Seth Lakeman's song, Circle Grows. Split into parts merely because it's too long for LJ to handle.
Art: Here.
Part I | Part II | Part III | Part IV
Simon had been with the resistance for five days. He didn't feel ready. He didn't feel as if he'd learnt anything, not anything that stuck -- he felt slower, stupider, adapting to a whole new kind of life. There was a woman who'd taught him some tricks, as she put it, and she called him as quick as he was pretty, but he didn't feel it. There was so much to think about. Ways to dodge the feds, the kind of places you could hide, passwords, a few little moves that might get him out of some trouble, some day...
He didn't feel as if he was cut out for this, at all. He was wearing his old clothes -- the cheap suit was unbearable -- and he felt he stuck out like a sore thumb, again, everywhere, far too fancy and aloof. He didn't mean to be, he just was, same as he'd been down on the streets.
But she'd called him quick, and apparently her opinion counted for something, counted more than his. The boss had decided it was time to speak to him, time to tell him what was what. Had decided, apparently, that he was going to play a fairly major part in what was going to happen.
"Any longer, and they're going to really start missin' you," the leader said, looking at him hard. Simon could never tell if this was the voice he'd heard on the phone. It sounded different, sharper, harsher, and yet there was something in the tone that was just the same. Something that stung, a goad. "You ready for this?"
He said yes. Of course he did.
"They're looking for you now, but they haven't really thought about your sister. They wouldn't, it's not something they'd expect a man to do, go running around after his sister like this... You're brave, at least." The man said it as if he knew that Simon was really petrified, on the inside. There was just that mocking hint about his face. But it softened, just a little. "Better than some city boys I've known. They wouldn't piss on their own mother if she was on fire, if the Alliance said it was unsanitary. You're a mite better than that. The girl you saved -- " for a moment, Simon couldn't even remember it, caught almost off-balance, and then he did, remembered that struggling pulse and the brittle body under his hands -- "she was my cousin's kid. You might live in the lap of luxury, but you do still have some human decency."
"I'm a doctor. I'm meant to help people. That's the reason I became a doctor in the first place."
"D'you know how many doctors really believe that?"
"All of them, I hope."
"You know they don't. They're meant to help people as long as they're getting paid, they think. Isn't that right?"
Simon didn't say anything.
"But you're different, anyway. I don't think you're ready for this, I don't know if you can do it -- "
"You haven't even told me what it is, yet," Simon said, quietly. It made him sound almost confident, assured, as if he actually thought it might be something he could do, after all. He didn't feel like that, not at all. He felt a little sick, actually.
"We're going to give you a little time to practice, of course. There'll be the trip to where she's been taken... Alright, then. I suppose it is time to tell you."
He had diagrams. He had passwords. He had a uniform. He had a getaway plan, he had fake identification, he had lists, he had names... Simon tried to take it all in, but had time for one main thought -- the uniform, he could manage the uniform, he could speak as clipped and precise as anyone, act out his part better than he could have dreamed. Maybe it was the only role he could have played, the only way he could possibly have fit in at all.
"The list of ships," one of them said, touching Simon's arm: it wasn't the leader, but one of the others, someone Simon had seen around a couple of times, even in his short time there. "If you can, look out for Serenity. If you have chance. You probably won't, you'll be running so hard, but... Serenity's not a bad boat. She don't look like much, but they got a decent mechanic on board, and the captain... he's not a bad sort. He's a Browncoat, fought in the battle of Serenity Valley. My brother fought with him. He'll do right by you. He'll do right by anyone who lets him get one up on the Alliance. And there's always Zoe. She's his second in command. She fought on for a while, after the war ended, was a whole heap of trouble the Alliance never quite managed to clean up. She'll help you, if you tell her the truth. And they might be on Persephone at the right time."
"Thanks," Simon said, more awkward than ever, without pointing out that there was a lot of maybe in all of that. It was help, an offering, and he'd take it. He'd have to take it -- that was one of the things he had to rely upon now. Or he would after this: this was a kind of point of no return. After this, he'd have nothing. Even now, he realised, he could turn back.
He could, if he was an asshole, if he was complicit, if he was a blank-faced jerk or some ignorant little rich boy. He could if he could forget River, and he knew he couldn't do that.
"Good luck," the man said, and this time he had a wry look about him, that said louder than words -- I think you'll need it.
And Simon tried to smile, tried to joke, voiced the thought: "I'll need it."
There was a kind of sympathy, then, and that was almost worse.
---
He was shot.
He managed to ascertain that much through a sudden heavy dizziness. He wondered if it was blood loss, but thought it more likely to be shock. His fingers found the entry wound, traced around it. There was a curious lack of pain, his thoughts slow and thick like they came through a layer of cotton wool, blurred and blunted. He knew where he was, he was in the Academy. Or in the complex where they experimented on his sister, anyway. Not necessarily the school she had originally gone to, after all. Perhaps that wasn't even likely. He couldn't remember if they had told him, or not. He suspected not: they hadn't told him very much, had they?
Nobody had ever told him it would feel like this. He thought he could feel the bullet inside him, despite the lack of pain, and he knew he was making pained noises, that blood was slick on his fingers, dripping onto the floor. He didn't seem to be able to do anything about it. But then he couldn't anyway, he'd never tried to operate on himself, that'd be crazy.
He realised that he might have to, and groaned as his head swam. His ears seemed packed with cotton wool, too. The whole of him. Cushioned. The brain's response to a situation it can't handle.
He could see River. She was lying on her back, some devices strapped to her, people gathered round her. They weren't even looking at him. He supposed he didn't matter so very much. He clearly posed no threat. But River -- he saw her body jerk, convulse, saw her mouth open and thought she might be screaming, too.
"River," he whispered.
He thought he could hear some sort of alarm, as well. It was making his ears ring, despite the cotton wool. There didn't seem to be much he could do. He tried to move, to raise himself up -- to get closer to River. But it hurt so much. It hurt so much. Funny kind of prince he made. Couldn't even lift a hand to save the princess, let alone fight the dragon or the evil witch or the evil witch who'd turned herself into a dragon, whatever the story had been. Couldn't hack through the hedge of thorns.
He thought someone was screaming his name, and that had to be River, but he couldn't get the energy to respond, to even lift his head, now. He imagined the warm dark pool of his blood on the cold floors, the way he must look -- almost like a soldier, but that was ridiculous, because he'd never fight. He couldn't fight. He would, for River, if he could, but he couldn't remember even holding a gun. And now he'd been shot by one...
Then there were hands on him, rough hands, hauling him to his feet, and he tried to fight because they were taking him away from River. But then he managed to focus, knew she was already gone, and there was a voice in his ear, gruff but warm, penetrating through the sticky cocoon of shock. "Quit fightin', boy, we're here to get you out."
"I'm hardly an asset," Simon said, but he stopped fighting, of course. He was coherent, outside of his own head. The words seemed to come out clear, anyway, and they seemed to be understood well enough. "Why would you -- "
"You could tell 'em about us," the man said, holding him tightly, half-carrying and half-dragging him. "And you're a doctor, ain't you? We need more doctors."
It was hard to speak, but it seemed important to hang on to life, to say something. "Of course. Self-interest."
"You can say that once we've got that bullet outta you."
Then the man was pushing him through a door, and people were laying hold of him, pushing and pulling him to lie down on a make-shift bed. Simon rests his head on the cool metal, tries not to think about the blood undoubtedly puddling beneath him already. He can feel the surge and ebb of his own blood. "Alright," he said, distantly, "I will."
The man looked down at him. Simon couldn't place his face at all, and he seemed to be getting further away all the time, but Simon thought they might be safe now, and that helped. "Tougher than I thought," the man said, but he probably wasn't speaking to Simon, and Simon was beyond any kind of reply in any case. Unconsciousness was warm and thick and black, and he knew no more.
---
There was blood slicking his hands again, but it wasn't his own. That was, at least, a good thing. Simon was used to high pressure but this --
"Get down," someone hissed, and he was about to snap or protest, but she was right, after all. He got down lower to the ground and crawled forward, dragging his latest patient with him awkwardly. She reached out and grabbed the other arm, yanking the injured man forward and behind some large crates. "I'll take care of him from here. Can he walk?"
"He'll need support, but he can walk a little. He has to."
"Right, doc," she said. She peeked over the top of the crates, firing a few shots. "Jack's been shot. Just his arm."
"Where is he?"
The woman raised her head over the barrier, fired again, then ducked behind, grabbing the unconscious man by the arms and hauling him backwards. "Over there," she said, nodding, and then it was like Simon didn't exist any more -- she was focusing back on the battle, on the blood and the guns. Simon crawled forward, his heart in his mouth.
"Doc," someone said, almost whispering compared to the noise of the guns and the cries of pain, and Simon crawled towards them, keeping his head down. "I'll cover you. You need to go help Smith."
"I heard -- "
"Smith's nearest. And I can cover you."
"Alright," Simon said, his heart sinking. When he'd agreed to do this -- he hadn't thought it'd be like this. This desperate. He should've known, should've thought... There'd always been a kind of glamour in the idea of a resistance, and the hint of a delicious fairytale. He and River had always played about it, half-romanticised it. There'd been mud and blood in their visions, but not this. Not quite this. He took a deep breath and rose to a half-crouch, ready to run for the next available cover.
"Now, doc," they said, whoever they were, and Simon went, tripping up and landing in a puddle, but safe. Not even grazed, this time.
Smith was pale and sweating, bleeding out. They were perilously close to the guns, there where he'd fallen, and Simon kept his head lower than ever. He couldn't help looking around, checking for some kind of weapon, some way to defend himself or escape... Smith's gun was right beside him, half under his body, glinting cold and steel. Simon took it, closing his hand around it, drew it out from under the man -- ignoring , and then he got to work.
He'd thought it was bad, working a hospital. Seeing little ones hurt, parents and grandparents looking to him for surety and reassurance, and him grim and tired and wordless from the fight with death. Seeing people turned almost inside out by accidents, by carelessness, and seeing their families tearing themselves apart too, as if they have to match. But the battlefield -- that was worse, that was raw. Simon could not truly give the man ease, and though his hands were steady, always steady, they were not gentle. He searched for the wounds, bandaged the man quickly, roughly, slip-shod -- work he'd have been ashamed of, before. Now he knows what's more important, though, and that's the minutes, hours, days, he might earn for this man.
He didn't know, afterwards, what had made him look up, or what instinct had made him reach for the gun. What instinct had made him bring the gun close in the first place. But his hand closed on it, brought it up just in time, without any time to mourn the necessity, the breaking of this rule --
The man fell with a shout, and Simon took a deep sharp breath and tried not to just drop the gun. "Stay there," he said, to the fallen man. He was in the colours of the other side -- clearly from the other side anyway, with his clean-shaven face and comparatively neat and clean clothes, with the neat bandage on his arm. "It's not serious. I'll deal with you once I've seen to our own."
"You're an odd one," someone said, at his elbow, but they were smiling and he, too, was smiling. Because this made a difference, made them different, gave one man a story to take back about decency and generosity.
They were laughing, teasing, and he smiled too.
---
The new recruits were full of energy, jittering, not yet learning the quiet patience of the older ones, the ones who'd been in this a while. Simon felt old, looking at them, even though he thought this one or that might have been older than him. They seemed fresh, somehow, naive. Simon yearned towards that, not yet hardened enough to have lost all the idealism, the shine.
"You got any family?" one of them asked. He was younger, perhaps not even twenty years of age yet, and his face was warm and open, ready to laugh. He was asking one of the veterans, but the man just gave him a look, as if to say, we don't ask that here. Simon cleared his throat.
"I have, I suppose. I was disowned by my parents, and my sister... she's why I fight."
"She killed?" the boy said, seeming at once disgusted and eager, ready to hear the worst of the Alliance. "Denied care?"
"Worse," Simon said, simply, but he could see the boy couldn't imagine worse, couldn't imagine his way out of the slums and dirt. "She's alive."
"Don't that mean you can at least rescue her?"
"I hope so. That's part of the reason why I'm here, after all."
He thought no one had been listening, but he didn't think it was a coincidence when one of the men got up and left the room. He couldn't quite remember who it had been, but it wasn't a face he recognised -- not one that he came into contact with every day.
He tried to conceal the hope on his face. Maybe, maybe this time. Maybe.
---
Simon never knew what he'd expected would happen when someone finally offered him another chance. He knew it'd be something big -- that he'd have had to do something big to earn it, because he'd failed them once before. He hadn't expected to be called into what looked like an old-style war room -- maps and terminals, people leaning over them and making marks, talking in low, serious voices. He wondered if this was new: there certainly hadn't been anything like this back when he was first a member. But then, he hadn't been trusted then.
People trusted him now. Most of them had found it necessary to trust him once or twice, and some people -- the ones who saw the most action, usually, because the simply clumsy ones ended up dead or deserting -- had been under his knife enough that he'd lost count.
He found it almost a surprise when he recognised every single face in the room.
"Doctor Tam," one of them said, straightening up when she saw him.
"Simon," he said, nodding slightly. "Hello, Jane."
"I'm surprised you recognised me, with how many patients you have."
"I've operated on you often enough."
She smiled, wryly. "There's that. Did you know I was..."
"One of the leaders? No. It's been a long time since I had anything direct from one of you."
"We didn't forget you," she said, putting a hand on his arm. "In fact, we've had our eye on you, and on your sister. It hasn't been easy, in her case, but we felt it was something we should take a special interest in. And my own sister is one of her... peers."
"I'm sorry."
"So am I," she said, grimacing a little, but then she shook her head. "There's something you should see. How much you were told about what was happening to your sister?"
"Experiments. Messing with her brain... Not much, honestly. And I didn't see much, during my attempt. I spent the first half of it pretending to be an ice-cold bastard, and the latter half trying not to bleed quite so much."
"You made quite a determined effort at dying. I was one of the rescue team."
Simon hesitated, looking at her face quickly and then away. "Your sister -- "
"I knew it wouldn't do any good. I didn't even see her." Jane shook her head. "But we don't have that much time. There's a meeting in here soon, I think, and I'm supposed to get this over with before then. Come on. Let's go and sit down in the quiet." She was already leading him to a connecting room, smaller, with just a couple of terminals and hard little seats. "It's not very comfortable, but... none of this is going to be comfortable. Sit down, here."
"What are you going to show me?"
"It's... your sister. You'll understand why she's a particular concern of ours." Jane didn't quite look at him. She brought up a video with a few quick movements and then stood up, leaving him alone with it.
He knew River immediately. Her hair was shorter, and she moved differently now -- graceful, more graceful than ever, but different. Still, he knew her -- the shape of her body, the quickness of her movements, always darting and quick. And her face, even though he saw barely a sliver of it, like a pale new moon. There seemed to be no expression on her face, but there were knives in her hands, bright and sharp. Simon twisted sharply, looking up at Jane, but she was turned away. He looked back quickly, knowing he shouldn't miss a moment, that there might not be a second chance to see it.
"You can watch it in your own time if you want," she said, as if she knew his thoughts. "But I don't think you'll want to."
The image flickered and changed. This time he saw River's face, and knew for sure that there was no expression. It was River, and yet not. Her mouth was set in a familiar line, her jaw tight, but her eyes were somehow blank, focused inward. She tilted her head for a moment as if listening, and Simon bit his lip as she darted suddenly up, up a wall that he knew he could not have climbed, hiding as someone came along the corridor. She seemed to almost melt out of sight, almost inhuman.
He watched when she dropped down lightly, knives in her hands again, and stole along the corridor. The image flickered again, showing something different -- a room, softly lit, a bedroom. There was a man on the bed, asleep, hair rumpled and body sprawled out.
The door opened.
"She's -- "
"Just watch," Jane said, quietly.
"Is she going to -- ?"
"Watch."
Simon looked back again. River was just entering the room. The door closed behind her, silently, and then he saw her moving up to the bed.
He couldn't watch, when she struck, quick as a snake, her expression unchanging. He opened his eyes again in time to see the blood-soaked bed, and River leaving the room.
"She's become an assassin," Jane said, softly. She turned again, putting her hand on Simon's shoulder. "Do you still want to rescue her?"
Simon looked at her and remembered her as she should have been. Smiling, laughing, dancing. Gentle. Not this silent deadly thing. "What have they done to her? She was never... She could never have done this."
"You know what they were doing. Playing with her brain. Playing with her. Brainwashing her."
"I do want this recording," Simon said, after a moment. His hands were pressed to his knees, as if he needed to force them still. He took a deep breath. "And I'll do anything to... to bring her back, to save her."
"What if she can't be saved?"
"I have to try." He hesitated. "Anything you get, of her. I don't know how you got this, but. If you can. Can I have it?"
"You're her brother," Jane said. "Of course. But it will be like this. They keep her on a tight rein except when they're using her. There won't be anything else."
He looked once more at the last still image, the bloody bed, and the door open where River had left the scene. "I have always taken River just as she was."
"This is different, though."
"I'm her brother." Simon clenched his fists hard, nails digging into his palms, deep and yet not deep enough. His jaw was clenched, and Jane thought he was shaking -- shaking with anger. "I'll save you," he said, but not to her, to the recording, to the blood-soaked bed. "I'll save you. Hold on, River."
Then he laughed, and perhaps that was the worst part, the bitter dark sound. It didn't sound as if it helped.
"Thank you," he said, getting up. "Let me know when you know what I can do. When there's some kind of plan."
"You probably won't like it."
"I don't like any of this."
---
Primum non nocere. Once it used to be the most important thing. First, do no harm.
He thought he would always hold to that, he thought there could never be anything that overrode it. But then he thought about River -- warmth and life as a child, never still, always running and moving, like her namesake, never still. And he thought about the glimpse of her he'd caught, tortured and pinned down, like a rare butterfly on cardboard. The way he seemed to remember her calling out his name -- and suddenly everything was easier. First there was an anger in him, that heated and moved him, prevented him from hesitating at the last moment. He knew that the people he shot probably had little to do with River, but they were all part of it. And then there was the knowledge that every step might take him closer, so every step was a hundred times more important. Every movement, every breath -- his breath, or those of the man he was supposed to kill.
It became easy. He got the guns ready, adjusted the sights, lay still in position and watched, waited for his moment. He became shockingly good at it. It was like an operation, in some ways, he told himself. You have to make sure everything is just right, first -- not just physically, but in the patient's mind, you have to know they understand, you have to know they know what you have to do and that they agree. It was more violent, though mostly not more bloody; it was so much bigger and yet further away and yet -- if he could think of it like excising a tumour --
But no. He still knew what it was. It was harm, it was death, and it didn't matter if it's for the greater good -- he had to know, remember, that the lives he took then would impact so many other lives.
That's what made it better than what they do. Because they didn't know what they do, or they didn't care, cutting River right out of the heart of her family, taking her for themselves, taking away the brightness and warmth of her that he always knew was there, like the sun.
First, do no harm. He could at least remember that, hold that in mind. Even if he couldn't hold to it.
---
It didn't take long for there to be more videos. Now they had her, Simon thought, they couldn't resist using her. It was noticed, even noted in the news sources that were generally Alliance-friendly. How the enemies of the Alliance were dying out like flies.
It didn't take a genius, although Simon was one, to imagine what the leaders of the resistance were thinking. River was more than just some object of pity, now. She had to be a priority, because they had to get her before she got them. Eventually the Alliance, or whoever held her leash, would work their way down the list to the leaders of the resistance.
Simon wondered for a moment what would happen to River when all the current enemies had conveniently disappeared, but it didn't take a genius to work that out, either. There'd always be some enemy. Someone would get hold of her and use her on the Alliance itself, perhaps, emptying it from the inside to facilitate a quick move up. If the resistance got hold of her --
Simon had always liked to think the best of people.
He'd seen the awe, though, as well as the fear, in the eyes of Jane and those like her. He'd seen the calculations going on behind their eyes. What they'd do with such a weapon if they could lay hand to it.
He looked down at his own hands, the growing callouses, the way they seemed to shape themselves ready to fit a gun. He looked at the gun not a metre away from him, laying ready and deadly. The opening at the end of the barrel looked almost like an eye, looking at him. He looked away.
"Both of us, River, huh? Just tools."
He gets up, turning off the recordings. He picks up his gun belt, his gun.
"I will save you," he said, but it wasn't clear who he was saying it to.
Part I | Part II | Part III | Part IV