Fic: The Special Kind (Firefly: Mal/Kaylee, PG)
Title: The Special Kind
Author: Jen (jazzfic)
Rating: PG
Pairing: Mal/Kaylee
Words: 4,417
Disclaimer: The characters belong to Joss, I'm just playing around with things.
Summary: All love stories must begin somewhere; Kaylee's is no different.
Notes: serenity_santa gift for lusciouspandora. This is the first time I've attempted Mal/Kaylee, so I'm very nervous about it all, to say the least (although it did turn out to be more Kaylee/Serenity/Mal than anything...OT3 anyone?). Anyway, I do hope you like it.
That it had been an inglorious first meeting was an undeniable fact. But if Kaylee had thought herself embarrassed by it all, it was for only the briefest moment, and nothing more. Her Daddy had taught her never to doubt other folk, be it in sincerity, trust, or gratitude; and she tried to remember this as she took in the sight of this man, staring at her over Bester's shoulder. It struck her immediately how deeply unreadable his eyes were, indeed, how unreadable everything was about him. But she wasn't fazed, and had taken heed of her father's words by responding with the only way she really knew--the truth of a bright and trusting girl.
With his invitation came the rapid-fire response: How long? Her fingers were busy at the small of her back, trying to rescue the cheap fabric, cheery blossoms that had come her way from a poor woman's market stall. Bester's hands, clumsy as ever, had spotted the neckline with grease; but she hadn't cared, because she'd been distracted, enthralled, with what had rested above their heads, the whirring heart of this strange vessel. She looked into his eyes, this stranger, and asked again, a childish fear that she couldn't keep away clipping at the edge of her words: How long can I stay?
Long as you like. Long as you can keep her in the sky.
She was young, but not so young as to immediately see the hard look shift aside for the time it took for his words to hit her, for Kaylee to understand that this boat mattered more to Malcolm Reynolds than an entire company of soldiers. Flushed and alert, and still feeling the hum of the engine, the success of mending it in an instant where her bemused companion had failed, she left her new captain with a grin, and the plea not to leave port without her.
She could've said the opposite, in fact; she was certain nothing had ever been so real, no voice so sincere.
--
"Oh, Daddy, I surely never saw another like her." Packing was a haphazard affair: she had three bags open on her old bedspread, and was attempting to throw her belongings simultaneously into all of them at once. Bernard Frye stood at the door, half in the light that streamed through the open windows, a brightness mirrored only by his daughter's smile. He watched her carefully, giving nothing away. "Cap'n says she don't run by the same pace as other boats--she's of the special kind, the sort most folk don't understand."
At this she stopped and looked at him, suddenly aware that her happiness must be like a fist to his chest. An independent soul since birth, she'd yet to leave the family home. It had to hurt him deeply.
"You do, though, Sunny. You understand her."
He hadn't called her that since age eleven, in the sharp light at sundown, running from the house to the edges of the property through grass cropped rough on her bare feet. When they hugged, she didn't cry. They both knew she was doing the right thing.
--
Her room on Serenity was sparsely fitted: single bunk on metal hinges, some shelves, desk and lamp (ingeniously hidden in a sunken enclave in the wall--it had taken her a long period of searching to finally locate the operating switch), and not much else. The previous occupant had bequeathed her a modest selection of data-padds--novels mainly, of the antiquated but enduring variety her Ma would've probably once enjoyed. Stories of good folk, living on the frontier. Morality tales and the like. Heady romances, really, if she were honest. She skimmed a few pages and placed them back on the shelf to read later. Recreational asides could wait; there was a whole new ship to explore, a whole crew she had yet to meet. Aside from Captain Reynolds, that is.
There'd been a moment earlier on, when he'd stood on her Daddy's porch in his long brown coat, hands by his sides, free from his pockets like an honest man, and had outlined the reasons why he needed a mechanic like Kaylee on his ship. His crew. She'd shivered a little at the feeling that came across her at these words, but had kept it quiet. And she remembered the dog, her old pet, licking the sweat from her palm, and realising with some shock that she'd never felt so nervous about something that, in her heart, felt so right.
Later, he'd hauled her bags from the back of the mule, taking her hand in his rough grasp to steady her as she jumped onto the floor of Serenity's hold, a loud echo that swallowed her rather meek thankyou. Nobody else in this wide space but them; she'd smiled quickly and held his gaze for a while, suspended like the buzz of a moth's wings caught between closed shutters and the wide-open night. And when they reached her room and he spoke something about coming to fetch her again in twenty minutes, Kaylee had stopped and wondered what it was about him that struck her as so familiar.
Maybe it was what he hadn't said, when he'd shaken her father's hand. Maybe, like the first sight of his derelict, ramshackle ship, she'd felt him there, his pain and most honest love, almost as a part of herself.
--
"Zoe, my first mate. And Wash, ship's pilot. This here's Kaylee Frye, mechanic to whom I've given the task of seein' that our little boat don't fall apart."
The woman, Zoe, immediately held out her hand. So did her companion, though not before frowning a little.
"Uh...Bester go to ground, Mal?"
The captain's mouth twitched slightly. "Kaylee's up to the job, no concerns on that," he said, ignoring Wash's expression, which managed--quite endearingly, Kaylee thought--to be both friendly and very slightly bemused.
She resited the urge to laugh; had she seen the look that passed between Zoe and Mal, she might have failed. As it was they parted without exchanging much more than some small pleasantries about the weather, and she was left with Zoe and Wash smiling in unison as Mal, one hand on her arm, guided her though the remaining corridors that stretched beyond the bridge. When they were out of sight, Kaylee asked, "His name's Wash?"
"By a stretch," Mal said. "Comes when a fellah ain't too original with his nicknames." He eyed her briefly, and dropped his hand. "They're married, too, by the way."
"Oh, now, I could tell that, easy."
"How so?"
"You gotta know what to look for. Way a woman stands shoulder to shoulder with a man she's long known, you can just tell that he's hers."
Mal frowned. "Well, it ain't exactly been long..."
"No matter," Kaylee continued, with a smile. "Known him in her mind for longer, I'll bet."
He paused at this, and turned to look at her carefully. "Your Daddy said you spoke like you understood folk too well. Guess I can see his point."
"Can't say nothin' 'less it ain't got some truth to it."
She watched him absorb this, waiting, wondering if those eyes had the first sight of his ship still imprinted on them, hot as a cattle-mark, burned deep to the retina. The filters and ventilation hummed with her words; Kaylee pressed one hand to the bulkhead, feeling in it the true voice, a new voice, a relationship solidifying between machine and human being. Serenity. Won't let you fall, not ever, long as I'm here.
At last Mal shook his head, and quietly resumed their tour through the ship.
--
They soon settled into a rhythm, following work where it came, diverting where it didn't, never really stopping in any one place for too long a time. It was simple, straightforward. Needs were met, those needs being of the most basic kind: coin to hand, a working ship, a crew kept occupied and fed. They flew as close to invisibility as was possible, avoiding the patrols and Alliance networks, with varying degrees of success. To Kaylee, it was very different to what she had grown up with, but at the same time strangely involving. She lapped up every moment like a stray calf to surrogate mother, eager to make the first impressions last.
Jayne Cobb was a man of the type she knew all-too well, headstrong and bullish to the extreme. What he lacked in social niceties he made up with an attitude that often saw him in more trouble than out of it. But there was fierce loyalty there; Kaylee recognised that right away, and so she let the teases and leers slide off her back with innocent good nature. As a way of handling him it seemed to work, though she had yet to properly control her blushes if the captain happened to overhear.
For a time she stayed put in her room, but found the cocoon-like quiet too much of a distraction; she had Wash help her rig a simple hammock in the engine room, and spent many hours curled upon it, watching the core spin in revolutions too fast to count. It helped the loneliness, or moreover, helped her to forget it was there to begin with. Because despite of what she'd said to her father, or Mal, she missed home plenty more than she'd ever admit.
Some things she'd left behind, knowing there'd not be enough space for all her childhood possessions, but in a fit of sentimentality she'd cut out a patch from her bedspread and had sewn it to the knee of her old jumpsuit. When Wash saw Kaylee's handiwork he'd wondered if the bear should be carrying a tool of some sort, to properly designate his occupation. Teddy bears and oil cans. She was sure that no two objects had ever looked so happy together.
--
The companion's name was Inara. Mal's introduction was brief and to the point, made during dinner, over protein dumplings laced with condensed milk to disguise the cardboard taste, and when he spoke his arms were folded tightly across his chest.
Kaylee smiled widely, overwhelmed a little by the sheer beauty of this woman standing at the end of the table. She couldn't help thinking that the image of china-doll loveliness, combined quite by accident in the same setting as their half-finished plates of food, was slightly surreal. "Are those real stones?" she asked, eyeing the shawl that was tied in the simple style around Inara's waist. "I never saw none weren't made of glass..."
"They are," Inara replied, her eyes gracious, accepting Kaylee's admiration in a way that made her feel as if a compliment had been given in return. It even silenced Jayne into a moment of respect, which amused the others greatly.
The rest of that evening passed without diversion, but to Kaylee there seemed to be one too many thoughts turning in her mind that she just couldn't pin down; and when she made her excuses to leave, Inara followed her into the corridor and pressed the shawl in Kaylee's hands, turning away before she could protest. Later, in her bunk, she looked at it, and as she did she remembered something else: that their captain, all the way through dinner, had not smiled once.
--
She thought of him often, it was true, but Kaylee refused to accept that her small infatuation was nothing more than a step up from gratitude, for she loved Serenity more than anything she'd ever known, and if it hadn't been for Mal, she'd have probably said goodbye to Bester from the ground, looking at the underbelly of the ship with mere curiosity for what might've been.
One day she returned to the engine room to find him on his haunches, torso angled slightly to reach a small part that had fallen out of sight. She could hear the sound of it rattling, and above that Mal's curses, Chinese so raw and blunt as to make her want to turn around and leave him alone.
But she didn't. She spoke instead.
"Lose somethin', Cap'n?"
"Oh, just my gorramn sanity."
Kaylee kneeled down so that she could see in. "That it I can hear shakin' about in there?"
He grunted. Taking this to be an affirmative answer, she slid to the floor. Confined spaces gave her no alarm, but she was usually alone to do this sort of thing. Mal was a factor she hadn't anticipated, not like this, so close that she could hear his breathing. So close that when she slipped a hand into the gap where the bolt had fallen (smaller hands; smaller than his) she had to concentrate on the feel of it, to not let it escape, and all because he was watching her. No movement, no words. Just watching. It wasn't like standing from the hard floor flushed and excited and trying not to giggle at Bester. He was here--eyes on her hand and the small prize clutched inside.
"Got it." Kaylee turned away, suddenly conscious of what her voice sounded like. She shifted from the engine and onto both feet.
Mal stood as well, brushing dust from the sleeves of his shirt. "It weren't my place to practice home mechanics," he said, with a shrug. "Never was much of a hand, Zoe can testify on that account, I'm sure. Blame it on your predecessor--damn boy was so useless I suppose I got into the habit of...checkin' on her." He glanced up, somewhat embarrassed. "Guess I don't need to, now she's got you."
He was already walking out when she replied, calling after him in a voice that was almost lost beneath the thick tremor of the engine.
"Ain't all true, Cap'n. Needs you just as much as..."
But she didn't finish. Half-turned, dark shadows falling across his face, she thought she saw him nod. "I know, little Kaylee." Her heart thumped inside, quicker than her thoughts, and she sat very still in the hammock for a long time after he'd gone.
--
Signs of aptitude were apparent early on--age seven or eight she could already thread a bolt better than any boy--but it wasn't until she reached her teens that Kaylee knew without a doubt that this was what she wanted to do with her life. One man's junk was her own personal treasure; she was as happy covered in grease as other girls were in yards of silk and ribbons. She could look at a broken part and have two or three solutions made up and ready to apply almost immediately. It fascinated her how people would simply discard things that didn't work, but it also hurt her, just a little, and as she grew up she became sensitive to mistreatment.
Once, in a scrap-yard when they were supposed to be looking for wing casings, her father found her crying over an EX-1 nose-cone that had come apart from its housing. He didn't admonish her, but waited until she was quiet, and said, Can't help them all, Kaylee.
She'd understood then, as she understood now. And when Serenity flew, deep and silent in the hours designated in space as night, she listened with every part of her body, thankful for being able to do this, to help just one.
--
After a month of unfortunate letdowns, it seemed that perhaps they'd found themselves in the sort of downward spiral that could only end in risking passage through the Core, where contacts were easier to come by, but the Alliance presence multiplied tenfold. Fortunately this didn't materialise; Mal had taken on a chance after sniffing out some rumours on the cortex, and it turned out to be the right choice. The job on Newhall was lucrative: high payout, nothing lost, and rare enough to warrant celebration. They stayed up until it was no longer the same day that had seen the first bottle uncorked, cards and coin littering the old table in the ship's mess. Inara was out with a client, and when Zoe pulled her husband by the hand out of the hatchway, she left a not-so-friendly order to Mal to clear everything away by morning.
The captain's response was to eye her innocently and nod.
"Yes, ma'am," he said, while Jayne, swaying a little on the opposite side of the table, gave Zoe a drunken salute.
Kaylee, tucked neatly on the old sofa at the far end of the room, met Zoe's eyes and smiled a goodnight. She hadn't had a lot to drink herself, just enough to make her drowsy and thoroughly bored of cards, but here, in her quiet corner, she was having a certain amount of fun simply watching Jayne get more and more confused over Mal's increasingly convoluted rules.
"No, no, no. Two pairs? Jayne, two pairs might get you outta jail this side o' Ezra, but here? Ain't worth a coin."
"Oh, yeah? In which ruttin' rulebook?"
Mal raised an eyebrow and spun his glass. "The one written in gold leaf an' leather-bound by Londinium monks--monks, Jayne, who also happen to hold a tournament by that rulebook every sixth year."
A moment passed as the mercenary absorbed this. "Well, they're some crazy rules, that's all I can say. Turnin' me inside out." He threw down his hand and scraped his chair back. "Fold. I'll see ya when it...ain't so fuzzy."
When he'd gone Mal lifted up the cards. He smiled a little but said nothing.
"That's some mean trickery, Cap'n."
"Kaylee." He turned abruptly, surprised to see her alone on the sofa. "You're...still here."
"Never left."
"No, I can see that."
She raised an eyebrow. "So, did Jayne win, then?"
"By about a stellar mile. Don't go tellin' him that, though."
"I think he'll be sore enough," she replied. "Can't see any point in addin' to the pain."
Mal got up, steady legs not quite betraying the amount of drink he'd consumed. When he was closer she shifted over, expecting him to sit. But he remained standing, looking between her and the space on the sofa; he seemed to be considering something. A moment passed and then his eyes met hers.
"Not sleepy?"
Kaylee shook her head. "Long as she's awake, so am I."
"Afraid she'll fly off into the never?" Finally he took a seat on one edge, forearms resting comfortably on his knees. The corners of his mouth moved a little and she realised he was teasing her. "Got her on a short old leash there, Kaylee."
"Not just me," she replied. "Seen you look back enough times when we were groundside today. If that ain't love, then I sure don't know what is."
A pause followed, and when she realised that he wasn't going to answer, Kaylee stood up. She felt the blood drain through her body, her skin tingling, and she jiggled her calves to jump-start the circulation out of drowsiness. But she had a feeling that he was still watching her, and turned to check.
He was. "Kaylee..."
At first she couldn't place his voice; she wondered if the blood had pooled in her ears, concussion and confusion, a dampening from the alcohol. She blinked. "Yes?"
"I'm sorry. About before. I got angry at Jayne, and--well, you were in the wrong place." He met her eyes, and she felt her throat constrict. "Words. They came out wrong."
Their gaze broke, snapped away. Kaylee said, "Came out all right, to me."
The room felt cold. She knew she should have left, taken his apology and turned it around into a sweet goodnight. But instead she moved back and knelt on her bare feet before him, took his hands between hers, and before her sudden impulse melted away, she kissed the place where his wrist and rolled-up sleeve met, warm skin, soft cotton, the smell of grease and gunpowder.
One kiss, that was all. She let go, and she waited.
--
It had happened before they'd landed on Newhall, in the short hours leading up to the job when they'd done all the preparation and nothing was left but time in which to wait. She'd been wandering through the ship, a little bored, and came across Jayne in the cargo hold. He was checking the rounds in the small armoury of weapons that he seemed to think was needed during this apparently risk-free heist.
"You need all them guns, huh?" she'd asked, happy for the distraction. Besides, teasing Jayne was always fun.
"Hell yeah, I need 'em." He eyeballed her, unsure, as the mercenary usually was, to what her motivations were. As this was Jayne, however, the moment of consideration was typically brief. He grinned. "Wanna help?"
She hesitated. Guns weren't a part of Kaylee's life. She'd seen her father hold one, many a time, but that was it. He'd kept them away from his daughter, to keep her safe (at least, she liked to think so--words to such extent had never been exchanged), and while she understood their purpose she'd never understood them, not really; never reconciled a man's need for such brutal and final means of defence.
Jayne held out the gun, cartridge empty, hooked on one thumb. He held it until it was there, in her hands, and she had no choice but to take the weight of it.
"Hey, looks good!"
Her mouth felt dry. "I don't know..."
"See if you can aim it, uh--aim it up there, where that little bit o' rust is just above the door. Go on, ain't gonna bite." He grinned again, pleased to have an audience. She didn't move; all she could see was Jayne's teeth, a spot of grease on his nose. "No? Oh, well, hand it back then--"
"Get that thing outta her hands."
The words cut through the air, sharp and sudden. And very angry. Out of nowhere Mal appeared, snatching the gun away before either of them could speak. He gripped it tightly, shoving it into Jayne, hard against the mercenary's chest, and turned away. A dozen steps and he was gone, and Kayee was left staring after him, words forming on her lips but completely without sound. So fast. He'd come and gone so fast.
Murmuring something to Jayne--an apology, an excuse, she didn't know--Kaylee left the hold.
They broke atmosphere ten minutes later. Another hour, and she was standing with Wash on the gantry, watching the mule drive off. When they returned, Mal was all celebrations and smiles, and Kaylee was smiling back, and they continued this way for the rest of the night.
But she felt as if something had caught itself between them, like a part had snapped and was floating off into space. And it hurt, just a little, to breathe.
--
Now, in the quiet, in the empty ship's mess with bottles on the table and cards abandoned from a made-up rulebook, they looked at each other. Trying to place what was behind those eyes, she found it almost too difficult a task; this was her captain, strange, solitary man, his gaze almost as unreadable here as the one they had shared in their first meeting. It was as if she was waiting for something, but didn't quite know what it was.
"Yeah," Mal said, at last. On her knees, she was still before him, and he drew back for a moment, weight on the edge of the sofa, and then, quite gently, he placed both hands on either side of her face. "Kinda knew you'd say that."
Kaylee smiled, sadly. "Ain't such a mystery, knowin' someone."
"No," he said. "I guess not."
It is an implicit thing, love. Before, she had imagined that loving someone in this way was like a keel, that it would somehow take away, piece by piece, the part of her that loved her ship, and her home. The part of her that lay alone in the engine room, feeling Serenity around her in all contentment, as if sleep and happiness had suddenly become a constant of the 'verse, like turbulence, pitch and yaw. Now, she wasn't so sure.
She's of the special kind, the sort most folk don't understand. But we do. We do it without thinking.
Kaylee realised, as he bent to kiss her, that it was no longer an apology of his lips. It had simply turned into thanks.
--
So it began, so on it went. They made and lost money in equal amounts, fell into bad luck and good. They learnt to leave the captain well alone come Unification Day. They learnt to be happy with the rewards, however small, when they came. On the morning they touched down on Persephone, the sun was so hot and high as to make the ships in dock shine like mirages; and it was there that they took on three passengers. Three passengers, and a box; one shepherd, one doctor, and one man out to take justice that wasn't his to take.
The box would later turn out to be both an error and a strange, sudden fate--but that, as with everything else, was all to come. In this moment Kaylee smiled at the new arrivals as they strode up the gantry, welcoming, as ever, different faces and stories to their ship. She trusted Mal to have made the right choices, although she'd had to convince him with accepting some aspects of this new integration; but as to the future, she made no plans above seeing them safely out into space again, and onto their next destination. Itinerant wanderings, following no map but where needs took them. Serenity, she liked to imagine, made these choices herself, but only the captain would hear this.
Only Mal, when they were alone, would see her smile and hear these words, because she could think of no other response, no better way to say I understand, the two of us. Means only what we make it. All we need to be. What they shared was beneath their feet; it was their bond, and their home. At night, she closed her eyes and said her thanks for opportunities and chance meetings; in the daytime, she laughed and made light of hard work.
The hammock never came down, and neither did the bear on her knee. In this way, she would think of where she had come from, and in the moments of forever, remember why.
Author: Jen (jazzfic)
Rating: PG
Pairing: Mal/Kaylee
Words: 4,417
Disclaimer: The characters belong to Joss, I'm just playing around with things.
Summary: All love stories must begin somewhere; Kaylee's is no different.
Notes: serenity_santa gift for lusciouspandora. This is the first time I've attempted Mal/Kaylee, so I'm very nervous about it all, to say the least (although it did turn out to be more Kaylee/Serenity/Mal than anything...OT3 anyone?). Anyway, I do hope you like it.
That it had been an inglorious first meeting was an undeniable fact. But if Kaylee had thought herself embarrassed by it all, it was for only the briefest moment, and nothing more. Her Daddy had taught her never to doubt other folk, be it in sincerity, trust, or gratitude; and she tried to remember this as she took in the sight of this man, staring at her over Bester's shoulder. It struck her immediately how deeply unreadable his eyes were, indeed, how unreadable everything was about him. But she wasn't fazed, and had taken heed of her father's words by responding with the only way she really knew--the truth of a bright and trusting girl.
With his invitation came the rapid-fire response: How long? Her fingers were busy at the small of her back, trying to rescue the cheap fabric, cheery blossoms that had come her way from a poor woman's market stall. Bester's hands, clumsy as ever, had spotted the neckline with grease; but she hadn't cared, because she'd been distracted, enthralled, with what had rested above their heads, the whirring heart of this strange vessel. She looked into his eyes, this stranger, and asked again, a childish fear that she couldn't keep away clipping at the edge of her words: How long can I stay?
Long as you like. Long as you can keep her in the sky.
She was young, but not so young as to immediately see the hard look shift aside for the time it took for his words to hit her, for Kaylee to understand that this boat mattered more to Malcolm Reynolds than an entire company of soldiers. Flushed and alert, and still feeling the hum of the engine, the success of mending it in an instant where her bemused companion had failed, she left her new captain with a grin, and the plea not to leave port without her.
She could've said the opposite, in fact; she was certain nothing had ever been so real, no voice so sincere.
--
"Oh, Daddy, I surely never saw another like her." Packing was a haphazard affair: she had three bags open on her old bedspread, and was attempting to throw her belongings simultaneously into all of them at once. Bernard Frye stood at the door, half in the light that streamed through the open windows, a brightness mirrored only by his daughter's smile. He watched her carefully, giving nothing away. "Cap'n says she don't run by the same pace as other boats--she's of the special kind, the sort most folk don't understand."
At this she stopped and looked at him, suddenly aware that her happiness must be like a fist to his chest. An independent soul since birth, she'd yet to leave the family home. It had to hurt him deeply.
"You do, though, Sunny. You understand her."
He hadn't called her that since age eleven, in the sharp light at sundown, running from the house to the edges of the property through grass cropped rough on her bare feet. When they hugged, she didn't cry. They both knew she was doing the right thing.
--
Her room on Serenity was sparsely fitted: single bunk on metal hinges, some shelves, desk and lamp (ingeniously hidden in a sunken enclave in the wall--it had taken her a long period of searching to finally locate the operating switch), and not much else. The previous occupant had bequeathed her a modest selection of data-padds--novels mainly, of the antiquated but enduring variety her Ma would've probably once enjoyed. Stories of good folk, living on the frontier. Morality tales and the like. Heady romances, really, if she were honest. She skimmed a few pages and placed them back on the shelf to read later. Recreational asides could wait; there was a whole new ship to explore, a whole crew she had yet to meet. Aside from Captain Reynolds, that is.
There'd been a moment earlier on, when he'd stood on her Daddy's porch in his long brown coat, hands by his sides, free from his pockets like an honest man, and had outlined the reasons why he needed a mechanic like Kaylee on his ship. His crew. She'd shivered a little at the feeling that came across her at these words, but had kept it quiet. And she remembered the dog, her old pet, licking the sweat from her palm, and realising with some shock that she'd never felt so nervous about something that, in her heart, felt so right.
Later, he'd hauled her bags from the back of the mule, taking her hand in his rough grasp to steady her as she jumped onto the floor of Serenity's hold, a loud echo that swallowed her rather meek thankyou. Nobody else in this wide space but them; she'd smiled quickly and held his gaze for a while, suspended like the buzz of a moth's wings caught between closed shutters and the wide-open night. And when they reached her room and he spoke something about coming to fetch her again in twenty minutes, Kaylee had stopped and wondered what it was about him that struck her as so familiar.
Maybe it was what he hadn't said, when he'd shaken her father's hand. Maybe, like the first sight of his derelict, ramshackle ship, she'd felt him there, his pain and most honest love, almost as a part of herself.
--
"Zoe, my first mate. And Wash, ship's pilot. This here's Kaylee Frye, mechanic to whom I've given the task of seein' that our little boat don't fall apart."
The woman, Zoe, immediately held out her hand. So did her companion, though not before frowning a little.
"Uh...Bester go to ground, Mal?"
The captain's mouth twitched slightly. "Kaylee's up to the job, no concerns on that," he said, ignoring Wash's expression, which managed--quite endearingly, Kaylee thought--to be both friendly and very slightly bemused.
She resited the urge to laugh; had she seen the look that passed between Zoe and Mal, she might have failed. As it was they parted without exchanging much more than some small pleasantries about the weather, and she was left with Zoe and Wash smiling in unison as Mal, one hand on her arm, guided her though the remaining corridors that stretched beyond the bridge. When they were out of sight, Kaylee asked, "His name's Wash?"
"By a stretch," Mal said. "Comes when a fellah ain't too original with his nicknames." He eyed her briefly, and dropped his hand. "They're married, too, by the way."
"Oh, now, I could tell that, easy."
"How so?"
"You gotta know what to look for. Way a woman stands shoulder to shoulder with a man she's long known, you can just tell that he's hers."
Mal frowned. "Well, it ain't exactly been long..."
"No matter," Kaylee continued, with a smile. "Known him in her mind for longer, I'll bet."
He paused at this, and turned to look at her carefully. "Your Daddy said you spoke like you understood folk too well. Guess I can see his point."
"Can't say nothin' 'less it ain't got some truth to it."
She watched him absorb this, waiting, wondering if those eyes had the first sight of his ship still imprinted on them, hot as a cattle-mark, burned deep to the retina. The filters and ventilation hummed with her words; Kaylee pressed one hand to the bulkhead, feeling in it the true voice, a new voice, a relationship solidifying between machine and human being. Serenity. Won't let you fall, not ever, long as I'm here.
At last Mal shook his head, and quietly resumed their tour through the ship.
--
They soon settled into a rhythm, following work where it came, diverting where it didn't, never really stopping in any one place for too long a time. It was simple, straightforward. Needs were met, those needs being of the most basic kind: coin to hand, a working ship, a crew kept occupied and fed. They flew as close to invisibility as was possible, avoiding the patrols and Alliance networks, with varying degrees of success. To Kaylee, it was very different to what she had grown up with, but at the same time strangely involving. She lapped up every moment like a stray calf to surrogate mother, eager to make the first impressions last.
Jayne Cobb was a man of the type she knew all-too well, headstrong and bullish to the extreme. What he lacked in social niceties he made up with an attitude that often saw him in more trouble than out of it. But there was fierce loyalty there; Kaylee recognised that right away, and so she let the teases and leers slide off her back with innocent good nature. As a way of handling him it seemed to work, though she had yet to properly control her blushes if the captain happened to overhear.
For a time she stayed put in her room, but found the cocoon-like quiet too much of a distraction; she had Wash help her rig a simple hammock in the engine room, and spent many hours curled upon it, watching the core spin in revolutions too fast to count. It helped the loneliness, or moreover, helped her to forget it was there to begin with. Because despite of what she'd said to her father, or Mal, she missed home plenty more than she'd ever admit.
Some things she'd left behind, knowing there'd not be enough space for all her childhood possessions, but in a fit of sentimentality she'd cut out a patch from her bedspread and had sewn it to the knee of her old jumpsuit. When Wash saw Kaylee's handiwork he'd wondered if the bear should be carrying a tool of some sort, to properly designate his occupation. Teddy bears and oil cans. She was sure that no two objects had ever looked so happy together.
--
The companion's name was Inara. Mal's introduction was brief and to the point, made during dinner, over protein dumplings laced with condensed milk to disguise the cardboard taste, and when he spoke his arms were folded tightly across his chest.
Kaylee smiled widely, overwhelmed a little by the sheer beauty of this woman standing at the end of the table. She couldn't help thinking that the image of china-doll loveliness, combined quite by accident in the same setting as their half-finished plates of food, was slightly surreal. "Are those real stones?" she asked, eyeing the shawl that was tied in the simple style around Inara's waist. "I never saw none weren't made of glass..."
"They are," Inara replied, her eyes gracious, accepting Kaylee's admiration in a way that made her feel as if a compliment had been given in return. It even silenced Jayne into a moment of respect, which amused the others greatly.
The rest of that evening passed without diversion, but to Kaylee there seemed to be one too many thoughts turning in her mind that she just couldn't pin down; and when she made her excuses to leave, Inara followed her into the corridor and pressed the shawl in Kaylee's hands, turning away before she could protest. Later, in her bunk, she looked at it, and as she did she remembered something else: that their captain, all the way through dinner, had not smiled once.
--
She thought of him often, it was true, but Kaylee refused to accept that her small infatuation was nothing more than a step up from gratitude, for she loved Serenity more than anything she'd ever known, and if it hadn't been for Mal, she'd have probably said goodbye to Bester from the ground, looking at the underbelly of the ship with mere curiosity for what might've been.
One day she returned to the engine room to find him on his haunches, torso angled slightly to reach a small part that had fallen out of sight. She could hear the sound of it rattling, and above that Mal's curses, Chinese so raw and blunt as to make her want to turn around and leave him alone.
But she didn't. She spoke instead.
"Lose somethin', Cap'n?"
"Oh, just my gorramn sanity."
Kaylee kneeled down so that she could see in. "That it I can hear shakin' about in there?"
He grunted. Taking this to be an affirmative answer, she slid to the floor. Confined spaces gave her no alarm, but she was usually alone to do this sort of thing. Mal was a factor she hadn't anticipated, not like this, so close that she could hear his breathing. So close that when she slipped a hand into the gap where the bolt had fallen (smaller hands; smaller than his) she had to concentrate on the feel of it, to not let it escape, and all because he was watching her. No movement, no words. Just watching. It wasn't like standing from the hard floor flushed and excited and trying not to giggle at Bester. He was here--eyes on her hand and the small prize clutched inside.
"Got it." Kaylee turned away, suddenly conscious of what her voice sounded like. She shifted from the engine and onto both feet.
Mal stood as well, brushing dust from the sleeves of his shirt. "It weren't my place to practice home mechanics," he said, with a shrug. "Never was much of a hand, Zoe can testify on that account, I'm sure. Blame it on your predecessor--damn boy was so useless I suppose I got into the habit of...checkin' on her." He glanced up, somewhat embarrassed. "Guess I don't need to, now she's got you."
He was already walking out when she replied, calling after him in a voice that was almost lost beneath the thick tremor of the engine.
"Ain't all true, Cap'n. Needs you just as much as..."
But she didn't finish. Half-turned, dark shadows falling across his face, she thought she saw him nod. "I know, little Kaylee." Her heart thumped inside, quicker than her thoughts, and she sat very still in the hammock for a long time after he'd gone.
--
Signs of aptitude were apparent early on--age seven or eight she could already thread a bolt better than any boy--but it wasn't until she reached her teens that Kaylee knew without a doubt that this was what she wanted to do with her life. One man's junk was her own personal treasure; she was as happy covered in grease as other girls were in yards of silk and ribbons. She could look at a broken part and have two or three solutions made up and ready to apply almost immediately. It fascinated her how people would simply discard things that didn't work, but it also hurt her, just a little, and as she grew up she became sensitive to mistreatment.
Once, in a scrap-yard when they were supposed to be looking for wing casings, her father found her crying over an EX-1 nose-cone that had come apart from its housing. He didn't admonish her, but waited until she was quiet, and said, Can't help them all, Kaylee.
She'd understood then, as she understood now. And when Serenity flew, deep and silent in the hours designated in space as night, she listened with every part of her body, thankful for being able to do this, to help just one.
--
After a month of unfortunate letdowns, it seemed that perhaps they'd found themselves in the sort of downward spiral that could only end in risking passage through the Core, where contacts were easier to come by, but the Alliance presence multiplied tenfold. Fortunately this didn't materialise; Mal had taken on a chance after sniffing out some rumours on the cortex, and it turned out to be the right choice. The job on Newhall was lucrative: high payout, nothing lost, and rare enough to warrant celebration. They stayed up until it was no longer the same day that had seen the first bottle uncorked, cards and coin littering the old table in the ship's mess. Inara was out with a client, and when Zoe pulled her husband by the hand out of the hatchway, she left a not-so-friendly order to Mal to clear everything away by morning.
The captain's response was to eye her innocently and nod.
"Yes, ma'am," he said, while Jayne, swaying a little on the opposite side of the table, gave Zoe a drunken salute.
Kaylee, tucked neatly on the old sofa at the far end of the room, met Zoe's eyes and smiled a goodnight. She hadn't had a lot to drink herself, just enough to make her drowsy and thoroughly bored of cards, but here, in her quiet corner, she was having a certain amount of fun simply watching Jayne get more and more confused over Mal's increasingly convoluted rules.
"No, no, no. Two pairs? Jayne, two pairs might get you outta jail this side o' Ezra, but here? Ain't worth a coin."
"Oh, yeah? In which ruttin' rulebook?"
Mal raised an eyebrow and spun his glass. "The one written in gold leaf an' leather-bound by Londinium monks--monks, Jayne, who also happen to hold a tournament by that rulebook every sixth year."
A moment passed as the mercenary absorbed this. "Well, they're some crazy rules, that's all I can say. Turnin' me inside out." He threw down his hand and scraped his chair back. "Fold. I'll see ya when it...ain't so fuzzy."
When he'd gone Mal lifted up the cards. He smiled a little but said nothing.
"That's some mean trickery, Cap'n."
"Kaylee." He turned abruptly, surprised to see her alone on the sofa. "You're...still here."
"Never left."
"No, I can see that."
She raised an eyebrow. "So, did Jayne win, then?"
"By about a stellar mile. Don't go tellin' him that, though."
"I think he'll be sore enough," she replied. "Can't see any point in addin' to the pain."
Mal got up, steady legs not quite betraying the amount of drink he'd consumed. When he was closer she shifted over, expecting him to sit. But he remained standing, looking between her and the space on the sofa; he seemed to be considering something. A moment passed and then his eyes met hers.
"Not sleepy?"
Kaylee shook her head. "Long as she's awake, so am I."
"Afraid she'll fly off into the never?" Finally he took a seat on one edge, forearms resting comfortably on his knees. The corners of his mouth moved a little and she realised he was teasing her. "Got her on a short old leash there, Kaylee."
"Not just me," she replied. "Seen you look back enough times when we were groundside today. If that ain't love, then I sure don't know what is."
A pause followed, and when she realised that he wasn't going to answer, Kaylee stood up. She felt the blood drain through her body, her skin tingling, and she jiggled her calves to jump-start the circulation out of drowsiness. But she had a feeling that he was still watching her, and turned to check.
He was. "Kaylee..."
At first she couldn't place his voice; she wondered if the blood had pooled in her ears, concussion and confusion, a dampening from the alcohol. She blinked. "Yes?"
"I'm sorry. About before. I got angry at Jayne, and--well, you were in the wrong place." He met her eyes, and she felt her throat constrict. "Words. They came out wrong."
Their gaze broke, snapped away. Kaylee said, "Came out all right, to me."
The room felt cold. She knew she should have left, taken his apology and turned it around into a sweet goodnight. But instead she moved back and knelt on her bare feet before him, took his hands between hers, and before her sudden impulse melted away, she kissed the place where his wrist and rolled-up sleeve met, warm skin, soft cotton, the smell of grease and gunpowder.
One kiss, that was all. She let go, and she waited.
--
It had happened before they'd landed on Newhall, in the short hours leading up to the job when they'd done all the preparation and nothing was left but time in which to wait. She'd been wandering through the ship, a little bored, and came across Jayne in the cargo hold. He was checking the rounds in the small armoury of weapons that he seemed to think was needed during this apparently risk-free heist.
"You need all them guns, huh?" she'd asked, happy for the distraction. Besides, teasing Jayne was always fun.
"Hell yeah, I need 'em." He eyeballed her, unsure, as the mercenary usually was, to what her motivations were. As this was Jayne, however, the moment of consideration was typically brief. He grinned. "Wanna help?"
She hesitated. Guns weren't a part of Kaylee's life. She'd seen her father hold one, many a time, but that was it. He'd kept them away from his daughter, to keep her safe (at least, she liked to think so--words to such extent had never been exchanged), and while she understood their purpose she'd never understood them, not really; never reconciled a man's need for such brutal and final means of defence.
Jayne held out the gun, cartridge empty, hooked on one thumb. He held it until it was there, in her hands, and she had no choice but to take the weight of it.
"Hey, looks good!"
Her mouth felt dry. "I don't know..."
"See if you can aim it, uh--aim it up there, where that little bit o' rust is just above the door. Go on, ain't gonna bite." He grinned again, pleased to have an audience. She didn't move; all she could see was Jayne's teeth, a spot of grease on his nose. "No? Oh, well, hand it back then--"
"Get that thing outta her hands."
The words cut through the air, sharp and sudden. And very angry. Out of nowhere Mal appeared, snatching the gun away before either of them could speak. He gripped it tightly, shoving it into Jayne, hard against the mercenary's chest, and turned away. A dozen steps and he was gone, and Kayee was left staring after him, words forming on her lips but completely without sound. So fast. He'd come and gone so fast.
Murmuring something to Jayne--an apology, an excuse, she didn't know--Kaylee left the hold.
They broke atmosphere ten minutes later. Another hour, and she was standing with Wash on the gantry, watching the mule drive off. When they returned, Mal was all celebrations and smiles, and Kaylee was smiling back, and they continued this way for the rest of the night.
But she felt as if something had caught itself between them, like a part had snapped and was floating off into space. And it hurt, just a little, to breathe.
--
Now, in the quiet, in the empty ship's mess with bottles on the table and cards abandoned from a made-up rulebook, they looked at each other. Trying to place what was behind those eyes, she found it almost too difficult a task; this was her captain, strange, solitary man, his gaze almost as unreadable here as the one they had shared in their first meeting. It was as if she was waiting for something, but didn't quite know what it was.
"Yeah," Mal said, at last. On her knees, she was still before him, and he drew back for a moment, weight on the edge of the sofa, and then, quite gently, he placed both hands on either side of her face. "Kinda knew you'd say that."
Kaylee smiled, sadly. "Ain't such a mystery, knowin' someone."
"No," he said. "I guess not."
It is an implicit thing, love. Before, she had imagined that loving someone in this way was like a keel, that it would somehow take away, piece by piece, the part of her that loved her ship, and her home. The part of her that lay alone in the engine room, feeling Serenity around her in all contentment, as if sleep and happiness had suddenly become a constant of the 'verse, like turbulence, pitch and yaw. Now, she wasn't so sure.
She's of the special kind, the sort most folk don't understand. But we do. We do it without thinking.
Kaylee realised, as he bent to kiss her, that it was no longer an apology of his lips. It had simply turned into thanks.
--
So it began, so on it went. They made and lost money in equal amounts, fell into bad luck and good. They learnt to leave the captain well alone come Unification Day. They learnt to be happy with the rewards, however small, when they came. On the morning they touched down on Persephone, the sun was so hot and high as to make the ships in dock shine like mirages; and it was there that they took on three passengers. Three passengers, and a box; one shepherd, one doctor, and one man out to take justice that wasn't his to take.
The box would later turn out to be both an error and a strange, sudden fate--but that, as with everything else, was all to come. In this moment Kaylee smiled at the new arrivals as they strode up the gantry, welcoming, as ever, different faces and stories to their ship. She trusted Mal to have made the right choices, although she'd had to convince him with accepting some aspects of this new integration; but as to the future, she made no plans above seeing them safely out into space again, and onto their next destination. Itinerant wanderings, following no map but where needs took them. Serenity, she liked to imagine, made these choices herself, but only the captain would hear this.
Only Mal, when they were alone, would see her smile and hear these words, because she could think of no other response, no better way to say I understand, the two of us. Means only what we make it. All we need to be. What they shared was beneath their feet; it was their bond, and their home. At night, she closed her eyes and said her thanks for opportunities and chance meetings; in the daytime, she laughed and made light of hard work.
The hammock never came down, and neither did the bear on her knee. In this way, she would think of where she had come from, and in the moments of forever, remember why.