Raising Mt. Olympus, part 2
Title: Raising Mt. Olympus: Hunter
Fandom: Firefly
Rating: PG, for now
Summary: He walked to her across the waves.... 2by2fics. Progression. Orion.
Characters: River, Jayne
Timeline: Post BDM
Disclaimer: Joss, Joss, Jossity, Joss
“She….” River stopped, remembering that she could speak with her own voice. “I’m sorry. You told me about the dry bleached bones and the flies on dead eyes.”
Jayne was refilling a canteen at the sluggish spring of groundwater that welled up from the center of the little oasis. River reached for his anger, feeling it was a just desert for the danger she had put him in but she felt only the water running over his hands, gritty and hot as the home to which he’d never meant to return. “Yer lucky the Rainy’s only just lifted. If it was full on Dry ya wouldn’t a come back outta there.”
“Jayne is not angry with her.”
Jayne shrugged, capping the canteen. “Jayne was fierce angry. A few hours gone past….” A strong wind punched River in the chest. It pressed between her ribs, squeezing the breath from her lungs. But her lungs pressed back, strong and deep because they were Jayne’s lungs and she fed them on anger until they could stand up to the storm.
River staggered under the force of the memory. Jayne watched her with a cautious eye but let her regain her own feet when the remembered wind pushed her to the desert floor. “For all that schoolin’ girl, you got a lot to learn yet.”
Not long after Miranda, with River’s mind n the mend, Simon had discovered that River had great difficulty keeping the surface thoughts of those around her separate from her own. The crew was at a loss for what to do about the revelation. For the most part they agreed to try to think quietly and hope Simon could help her.
For his part, Jayne didn’t see the necessity of it all. In fact, when she read something off him by accident he’d taken to thinking especially nasty things at her, saying he’d get in her business if she didn’t stay out of his. She’d been treated to his annoyance and frustration with the crazy girl more than once, the feelings stealing over her before she knew they didn’t belong. He called it “educating” but River thought it was just vengeance. This time she’d felt his anger but she felt a dogged determination there too, poured over guilt for something he hadn’t done wrong. “I’m sorry,” she said again.
“Crazies ‘re always wanderin’ out into the Blank lookin’ fer somethin’ or other. I knew you was crazy. Shoulda known you’d go wanderin’.” Jayne rubbed the back of a hand against his eyes, frowning.
River cupped her hands in the warm groundwater and lifted them to her lips to drink. Though the chill of the night was setting in, the water remembered the full sun and tasted of heat and minerals. It was weak water. Or maybe water that had been strong once, flowing though forests in a far away place and plunging over cliffs, modifying with each descent. But had it modified itself or only the landscape that she tasted, loamy and distant, between the grains of sand? “This is not good water,” she said. “It is shrunken and feeble.”
“This?” Jayne laughed. “What’d I tell you? You need educatin’. This here’s the water that held out all the way since the Rainy. Might be that it sticks around even in the Dry, save some lives.” He paused in rubbing his eyes. “Sure saved ours.”
“But it used to be a stream,” she replied because the truth was more than she could bear. “Now it’s mud.”
“Used to be a river,” he said, drawing the metaphor without relish or spite because he never learned about metaphors. “It’ll be back around come next Rainy. You can count on that.”
River tasted the tang of the sediment that had settled on her teeth. She decided she didn’t like this part of Chios much either, though it was the other part, the secret part, that she hated. “And the Rainy always comes?” She knew the fixed weather patterns of this moon, five months of rain brought in from the ocean followed by five months of drought when the wind turned the other direction. But from where she knelt in the sand, feeling the dampness of her life leak out into the arid landscape, she found it hard to believe that the rivers would rise again.
“Rainy’s been comin’ back again every year jus’ the same as when my gran came out to this rock. Don’t you worry” Jayne was blinking in the rising dusk. “The Dry’s the time to get things done anyway. Can’t move about in the Rainy.”
River stood, feeling a fear that couldn’t be her own yet. She was nearly toe to toe with the big mercenary. He was rubbing at his eyes with a fist again but River stopped him with a hand on his wrist. Jayne looked away from her but not before she saw. “Your eyes are like the heavens,” she said. “Milky.”
Jayne swore and thought powerfully of a wizened old man in the border town who mixed powders and potions for coin. “Shoulda brought your brother along,” Jayne said. “I can’t see.”
Fandom: Firefly
Rating: PG, for now
Summary: He walked to her across the waves.... 2by2fics. Progression. Orion.
Characters: River, Jayne
Timeline: Post BDM
Disclaimer: Joss, Joss, Jossity, Joss
“She….” River stopped, remembering that she could speak with her own voice. “I’m sorry. You told me about the dry bleached bones and the flies on dead eyes.”
Jayne was refilling a canteen at the sluggish spring of groundwater that welled up from the center of the little oasis. River reached for his anger, feeling it was a just desert for the danger she had put him in but she felt only the water running over his hands, gritty and hot as the home to which he’d never meant to return. “Yer lucky the Rainy’s only just lifted. If it was full on Dry ya wouldn’t a come back outta there.”
“Jayne is not angry with her.”
Jayne shrugged, capping the canteen. “Jayne was fierce angry. A few hours gone past….” A strong wind punched River in the chest. It pressed between her ribs, squeezing the breath from her lungs. But her lungs pressed back, strong and deep because they were Jayne’s lungs and she fed them on anger until they could stand up to the storm.
River staggered under the force of the memory. Jayne watched her with a cautious eye but let her regain her own feet when the remembered wind pushed her to the desert floor. “For all that schoolin’ girl, you got a lot to learn yet.”
Not long after Miranda, with River’s mind n the mend, Simon had discovered that River had great difficulty keeping the surface thoughts of those around her separate from her own. The crew was at a loss for what to do about the revelation. For the most part they agreed to try to think quietly and hope Simon could help her.
For his part, Jayne didn’t see the necessity of it all. In fact, when she read something off him by accident he’d taken to thinking especially nasty things at her, saying he’d get in her business if she didn’t stay out of his. She’d been treated to his annoyance and frustration with the crazy girl more than once, the feelings stealing over her before she knew they didn’t belong. He called it “educating” but River thought it was just vengeance. This time she’d felt his anger but she felt a dogged determination there too, poured over guilt for something he hadn’t done wrong. “I’m sorry,” she said again.
“Crazies ‘re always wanderin’ out into the Blank lookin’ fer somethin’ or other. I knew you was crazy. Shoulda known you’d go wanderin’.” Jayne rubbed the back of a hand against his eyes, frowning.
River cupped her hands in the warm groundwater and lifted them to her lips to drink. Though the chill of the night was setting in, the water remembered the full sun and tasted of heat and minerals. It was weak water. Or maybe water that had been strong once, flowing though forests in a far away place and plunging over cliffs, modifying with each descent. But had it modified itself or only the landscape that she tasted, loamy and distant, between the grains of sand? “This is not good water,” she said. “It is shrunken and feeble.”
“This?” Jayne laughed. “What’d I tell you? You need educatin’. This here’s the water that held out all the way since the Rainy. Might be that it sticks around even in the Dry, save some lives.” He paused in rubbing his eyes. “Sure saved ours.”
“But it used to be a stream,” she replied because the truth was more than she could bear. “Now it’s mud.”
“Used to be a river,” he said, drawing the metaphor without relish or spite because he never learned about metaphors. “It’ll be back around come next Rainy. You can count on that.”
River tasted the tang of the sediment that had settled on her teeth. She decided she didn’t like this part of Chios much either, though it was the other part, the secret part, that she hated. “And the Rainy always comes?” She knew the fixed weather patterns of this moon, five months of rain brought in from the ocean followed by five months of drought when the wind turned the other direction. But from where she knelt in the sand, feeling the dampness of her life leak out into the arid landscape, she found it hard to believe that the rivers would rise again.
“Rainy’s been comin’ back again every year jus’ the same as when my gran came out to this rock. Don’t you worry” Jayne was blinking in the rising dusk. “The Dry’s the time to get things done anyway. Can’t move about in the Rainy.”
River stood, feeling a fear that couldn’t be her own yet. She was nearly toe to toe with the big mercenary. He was rubbing at his eyes with a fist again but River stopped him with a hand on his wrist. Jayne looked away from her but not before she saw. “Your eyes are like the heavens,” she said. “Milky.”
Jayne swore and thought powerfully of a wizened old man in the border town who mixed powders and potions for coin. “Shoulda brought your brother along,” Jayne said. “I can’t see.”