Not Wrong
Title: Not Wrong
Author: zoewarren
Rating: all ages
Characters: River, Mal, Kaylee, Inara
Challenge: #053 - River
Spoilers/Timeline: post-BDM (spoilers for the movie)
Word Count: 550
Sequel to: in the same 'verse as all my stories, but stands alone very well
Disclaimer: Joss is boss, I'm just playing
Summary: After Miranda, River finds her balance
Author's Note:
I'm working on the next in my ongoing Mal/Inara saga, and found that River is becoming a more pivotal character. I always meant to include her in the stories (and Kaylee, for that matter), but the style is so sparse, there was nowhere to wedge them in. So this is a little bit of me catching up with River, learning what she's been up to in the year or so since the events at Miranda.
Not Wrong
It was different for River, after Miranda. When she knew for sure she wasn't going crazy. Once she had seen with her own eyes the horrors that plagued her nightmares, once she knew they were someone else's memories.
Now she could trust her own mind. Now she could begin to tell her own memories from those of others.
And, with hours spent alone on the bridge, River began searching the news feeds. She devoured the reports from the core worlds telling of infighting and backstabbing as members of parliament fought to keep their seats in the wake of the Miranda broadcast. One by one they all fell. And that was soothing, too.
And she was learning again, and that helped most of all. The Captain was her first teacher. He sat with her for every take off and every landing for months, teaching her everything he knew about piloting ships, about piloting Serenity. It wasn't much more than she knew already, but she liked to hear him say it. Especially about Serenity. And sometimes he would tell stories, explaining how he had learned a trick or a shortcut, back in the war or in the early days on Serenity, and those were her favourite lessons.
The Captain still insisted that the navigational computer plot every course, but eventually he began talking her through the basic calculations, the various factors that must be considered in building a flight plan. Relative orbits of planets and suns, gravitational pulls, solar winds, asteroids, debris, known shipping lanes, smugglers' shipping lanes, Alliance patrol routes, and on and on. And this was where River fell in love. This was where she could learn to make the numbers sing. So she began searching the Cortex for information on navigation and its complex calculations. The nav computer still plotted Serenity's course, but River was starting to run her own calculations and compare them afterwards. She wasn't always right, but she was getting better and better.
And soon she wanted more. She could be a better pilot the more she understood about how the ship worked. So she joined Kaylee in the engine room. And when they were talking engine parts and thrust and steering, Kaylee spoke to her just like she was another grown up, like she was a *pilot*. And she got to feel like maybe she really was one.
And then Inara noticed. And when she asked, River admitted it felt nice to be learning new things. Inara pointed out she was a teacher, and offered to help broaden River's education beyond nav calculations and engine parts. And River could only nod, because she didn't know how to express the relief that she could keep learning without ever having to go to another school.
So Inara came to sit with her on the bridge in the long stretches of black. Sometimes she brought Grace, sometimes not. And she would ask River about the book or the music or the art that was part of the lesson, ask what she thought and why she thought it. And no answer was ever wrong, just maybe different.
And River got to talk like a person, and it reminded her of life Before. And she thought this, now, is life After.
And it was different, maybe, but it wasn't wrong.
Author: zoewarren
Rating: all ages
Characters: River, Mal, Kaylee, Inara
Challenge: #053 - River
Spoilers/Timeline: post-BDM (spoilers for the movie)
Word Count: 550
Sequel to: in the same 'verse as all my stories, but stands alone very well
Disclaimer: Joss is boss, I'm just playing
Summary: After Miranda, River finds her balance
Author's Note:
I'm working on the next in my ongoing Mal/Inara saga, and found that River is becoming a more pivotal character. I always meant to include her in the stories (and Kaylee, for that matter), but the style is so sparse, there was nowhere to wedge them in. So this is a little bit of me catching up with River, learning what she's been up to in the year or so since the events at Miranda.
Not Wrong
It was different for River, after Miranda. When she knew for sure she wasn't going crazy. Once she had seen with her own eyes the horrors that plagued her nightmares, once she knew they were someone else's memories.
Now she could trust her own mind. Now she could begin to tell her own memories from those of others.
And, with hours spent alone on the bridge, River began searching the news feeds. She devoured the reports from the core worlds telling of infighting and backstabbing as members of parliament fought to keep their seats in the wake of the Miranda broadcast. One by one they all fell. And that was soothing, too.
And she was learning again, and that helped most of all. The Captain was her first teacher. He sat with her for every take off and every landing for months, teaching her everything he knew about piloting ships, about piloting Serenity. It wasn't much more than she knew already, but she liked to hear him say it. Especially about Serenity. And sometimes he would tell stories, explaining how he had learned a trick or a shortcut, back in the war or in the early days on Serenity, and those were her favourite lessons.
The Captain still insisted that the navigational computer plot every course, but eventually he began talking her through the basic calculations, the various factors that must be considered in building a flight plan. Relative orbits of planets and suns, gravitational pulls, solar winds, asteroids, debris, known shipping lanes, smugglers' shipping lanes, Alliance patrol routes, and on and on. And this was where River fell in love. This was where she could learn to make the numbers sing. So she began searching the Cortex for information on navigation and its complex calculations. The nav computer still plotted Serenity's course, but River was starting to run her own calculations and compare them afterwards. She wasn't always right, but she was getting better and better.
And soon she wanted more. She could be a better pilot the more she understood about how the ship worked. So she joined Kaylee in the engine room. And when they were talking engine parts and thrust and steering, Kaylee spoke to her just like she was another grown up, like she was a *pilot*. And she got to feel like maybe she really was one.
And then Inara noticed. And when she asked, River admitted it felt nice to be learning new things. Inara pointed out she was a teacher, and offered to help broaden River's education beyond nav calculations and engine parts. And River could only nod, because she didn't know how to express the relief that she could keep learning without ever having to go to another school.
So Inara came to sit with her on the bridge in the long stretches of black. Sometimes she brought Grace, sometimes not. And she would ask River about the book or the music or the art that was part of the lesson, ask what she thought and why she thought it. And no answer was ever wrong, just maybe different.
And River got to talk like a person, and it reminded her of life Before. And she thought this, now, is life After.
And it was different, maybe, but it wasn't wrong.