Title: No Quarter

Author: Eleanor K.

Fandom: Firefly

Pairing: Mal/Simon

Rating: PG-13

Posted: 4 Feb 2003

Spoilers: War Stories, Serenity

Email: emungere@gmail.com

Series/Sequel: The series: Fuzzy, Tokens, Intersections, The Widening Gyre, The Empty Sky, No Quarter.

Disclaimer: Not mine. Not ever going to be mine. *sigh*

Warnings: violence, crude language, that sort of thing. Nothing big.

Notes: Thanks as always to Cabiria, who always knows somehow when I'm being lazy and always calls me on it.

..___..


Grim determination sets in as Simon watches Jayne distribute the cans. Mal understandably wouldn't let him practice on the ship, and this is the first time he's picked up a gun in almost a month. It was a long haul between the councilor's planet and Ezarria, and he suspects he's already lost what little skill he'd gained.

Jayne wanders back to stand behind Simon, well out of the line of fire. "Okay, Doc. Go for it."

He lines up the barrel with the first can, corrects for the inevitable upwards jerk--

--and loses his concentration completely when a roaring whine announces the return of Zoe and Mal in the spare shuttle. It lands beside Serenity, the downdraft from its engines knocking over cans and scattering them across the rock. Simon coughs and rubs grit out of his eyes.

"Weird they didn't dock it with the ship." Jayne's voice is too casual, and as he steps in front of Simon, his hand rests on his holster.

They wait in a silence that has suddenly become very tense.

Minutes pass without any sign of activity, and now that the dust has died down they can see there is no one at the controls.

"Go open the door," Jayne says.

"Me?" The question gets away from him before he can stop himself.

"Yeah, you. I ain't trusting you to cover me, so go on. Get."

"Right," Simon mutters.

He walks up to the shuttle, glancing back at Jayne, who motions him to stand to one side while he opens the door. Jayne is aiming straight for the door, and Simon has no problem with getting out of the way. He reaches for the latch and steps back as the door opens.

Nothing. No sound from within, no light, certainly no Mal and Zoe. His heart rate, calm through all of this, starts to pick up.

Jayne approaches, enters the shuttle gun first, and switches the lights on. Simon waits, hearing him move around inside and finally hearing his voice, muffled and unsettled-sounding.

"What the hell..."

Simon steps in cautiously and finds Jayne up in the cockpit.

"What?" Simon asks him. "What's going on? How did the shuttle get here with no one to pilot it?"

Jayne gestures at a metal cube attached to the instrument panel.

"Preprogrammed autopilot. That ain't no mystery. I was looking at that."

He jerks his chin toward one of the chairs. There is a piece of paper lying on the seat, and Simon picks it up.

"I take what is owed to me," Simon reads out loud, "with accumulated interest. Please do try to buy them back. I would gladly add to my collection."

He looks up at Jayne, but Jayne is looking at the sheet of paper as if it's going to reach out and bite him.

"You think...Niska?" Jayne asks.

"It seems likely."

"Ta mah duh," Jayne mutters. "Gorram idiots, getting themselves caught. What the ruttin' hell am I supposed to do now?"

He jerks the paper out of Simon's hands, and Simon can see the worry growing on his face. Simon supposes he should be thankful that Jayne's first reaction isn't to abandon Mal and Zoe and take Serenity for himself. Worry and confusion, if not helpful, aren't going to make things more difficult, either. In fact, confusion from Jayne is good. It means he'll be more willing to follow orders.

"I think," Simon says slowly, "that you should ask everyone to assemble in the kitchen. I'll be along in a few minutes. I need to get something from my room."

"You got a plan or something?" The relief is clear on Jayne's face.

"Yes. Or something."

It wasn't really a rescue mission he was planning, but it can be adapted.

It will have to be adapted, and it will have to work. He won't consider anything else.

***

There is dead silence around the table when Simon has finished speaking.

He turns to Inara, whose eyes he has been avoiding since he entered the room. "I'm sorry," he says. "It was the only thing I could come up with that had a genuine chance of success. Can you do it?"

She swallows, but her composure doesn't falter. "Yes," she says softly. "I think so. I think...he'll be glad to let me dock." She glances around the table at questioning faces. "He was a client once, a long time ago. Under another name."

"You won't even have to see him," Simon promises, hoping to god he's telling the truth. "You just have to dock, and I can get into the air vent. That's all. Then you can take off."

"He won't-- He won't be suspicious? When I leave?"

He can see her trying to bring herself to offer to distract Niska. He can't let her do that, not even for Mal.

"No. He'll just think you changed your mind. That you're scared."

"He'll be right," she admits.

"It won't just be you," Wash mumbles.

Simon turns to him. "And the rest of it? Do you think you can do it?"

Wash nods thoughtfully, and his eyes are calmer than they have been since he heard the news.

"The trajectory'll be trickier than last time. We'll have to put some kind of, I don't know, padding or something on the ship, so we don't bump the station." He looks at Simon. "I can do it."

"I don't see why it's gotta be you, Doc," Jayne says suddenly. "I ought to be the one going with Inara."

"You won't fit through the air vent."

Book looks up from his study of the blueprints. "I'd fit, son. Be glad to do it."

Regretfully, Simon shakes his head. He traces a path through the airshafts that run from the shuttle dock to Niska's torture chamber, ending in a vent in the ceiling.

"At most I'll have to shoot Niska and his torturer from a few feet above them, when they're not expecting trouble. I can do that. You and Jayne and Wash will have the harder job. You'll have to clear a path to the elevator."

"From the hole you want us to cut in the bottom of the skyplex," Book says, smiling slightly. "It occurs to me that you came up with this plan awfully fast."

"Can you think of anything better?" Simons asks. Book holds his gaze for a second but makes no response. "Right. Then we'd better get going. Unless anyone sees any major flaws?"

"You're going to die," says a soft voice. "Just like I did."

"River..." But she runs from the room, and he can't go after her. He takes a deep breath and looks around. "Anyone else?"

No one has major flaws to point out, but there is enough discussion that it is almost half an hour before he can go and look for River. He checks her room, but she isn't there.

"Simon?"

She is in his room, sitting on his bed, hugging her knees. He sits by her and pulls her into his arms.

"It's all right, mei mei. It's all right." He rocks her back and forth as she hugs him tight.

There is nothing else to do. She doesn't want him to go, and he's going anyway.

***

He and Inara are in her shuttle on the way to Niska's skyplex. There is something he has to ask her before they get there.

"Inara...about River..."

"I'll do my best for her, Simon. We all will. But she needs you. Don't let anything happen to you."

She is right. River does need him, and he shouldn't be doing this. He should never have allowed himself to become this involved, but he is, and it's too late. He has to go. Leaving Mal to torture and death--impossible. As impossible as leaving River at the Academy was.

"Thank you."

The words are inadequate, but they are all he can offer.

There is a beep, and Inara checks the consol. "They're hailing us."

He moves out of sight of the camera and watches as Inara composes her face and presses the receive button.

Inara goes through the preliminaries with some flunky and then asks if Viktor is still working for "Boris"--presumably the name Niska was going by when she encountered him.

"He'd remember me," she says.

A minute later, Viktor appears on the screen. He inclines his head, a deep nod or an abbreviated bow.

"Inara Serra. I hadn't expected to see you again."

She smiles, and Simon could almost swear there is real warmth there.

"I hadn't planned to come back, but...things change. I'd like the opportunity to speak with your employer. Perhaps you'd be kind enough to arrange that for me?"

Viktor isn't smiling. "Ms. Serra, this isn't really a good time--"

"It's not the best time for me, either, Viktor." She smiles sadly, intimately, and Simon watches Viktor's face soften. "Times have been difficult. Boris did tell me to call upon him should I ever find myself...in distress."

Niska's actual words had been, "Perhaps circumstances will bring together again, yes? Right now, you think never to see me again, but desperation can drive us to many things. Perhaps it will even drive you back to me. I let you go now in the hope that we will meet again, and I will be able to truly know you."

It had chilled Simon to hear her recite the words from memory. She didn't know what Niska meant by 'truly know you,' and Simon hopes she never will.

Viktor glances off screen and then leans closer. "Ms. Serra, if you have any other options--"

"Would I be here, Viktor, if I had any other options?"

"No, ma'am. I guess you wouldn't." A pause. "You're cleared to dock."

"Thank you, Viktor."

"Don't thank me."

The screen goes blank, and Inara sinks back into her chair, closing her eyes for a moment.

"Are you all right?" Simon asks.

"I'm...fine. I didn't think it would be so hard." Her hand smoothes over her hair, twitching a wayward strand into place. "Well, it's done. I'm sure he'll be pleased to think I'm desperate enough to come back to him. It's a good thing Viktor still works for him. I might have had a hard time convincing anyone else."

"You know this Viktor?"

"He's Niska's right-hand man. He takes care of the details while Niska looks at the big picture." She looks away from Simon, out at the stars. "Afterwards...I was one of the details. He was very professional, and I appreciated that."

Her tone makes it clear that the subject is closed, and a few seconds later the docking signal comes through.

"We're here," she says. "You'd better get ready."

He stands on the chair to unlatch a panel in the ceiling. "Good luck," he says.

"You, too."

He pulls himself up and fastens the panel in place behind him. Less than a minute later he feels the docking clamps engage, pressure equalizing, air exchange beginning. The shuttle can stay self-contained, but on most ships and stations the air ducts will connect and replenish the air supply.

He crawls forward, the space lit only by seams of light from below where the panels are joined together. When he reaches the end of the shuttle, he pulls out his small flashlight and switches it on. The docking cycle is sixty seconds. He now has forty to get out into the skyplex before the guards can open up Inara's shuttle. He told her to leave before that happened, no matter what. He hopes she will.

He puts the flashlight between his teeth and pops out the grate and the filter behind it, crawls through, replaces them.

That's it. That simple. He is inside the skyplex. He closes his eyes for just a second and then starts moving right away because now would be a very bad time to admit that he is scared shitless.

Dark, dark goddamn tunnels, just big enough for him to crawl through, maybe big enough to turn around if he absolutely had to. Twenty feet down the tunnel he hears a click and a whir behind him as the shuttle is sealed off again.

His heart hammers in his chest, and he does his best to ignore it. There is only one way out now, and that is forward.

The metal walls of the duct have an unfortunate tendency to echo, and he moves slowly, as noiselessly as he can. He tastes dust and bile, and it is too warm. His knees hurt already. He wants to be back on Serenity.

Can't stop. The fear just isn't relevant. He was scared to death when he was trying to get River out of the Academy, too. Scared that any second could bring a call that she'd had an 'accident,' died in their hands, or a call from the police that no amount of bail money could fix, scared that he'd open that box and it would be empty, and he'd have lost his only chance to get her out. None of it mattered. It was just one logical step after another. Just like this.

First get to the torture chamber. Worry later about what would happen once he got there.

He comes to a fork in the duct. He knows he has to go left because he studied the blueprints until they were etched into his eyes, but he checks anyway.

He goes left.

Then right.

Then right again.

Then--dead end.

He pulls out the blueprints again with shaking hands. Sweat gathers at his back and drips down his sides. He traces out his path. He didn't take a wrong turn. This is the right way. The blueprints are out of date.

He stares at the flat metal in front of him. Panic rises in his throat, and he bites it down.

Wiping sweat out of his eyes, he studies the blueprints again. He knew the route so well he almost didn't bring them along.

He shuffles backwards to the last intersection and takes the other fork. Light appears in the duct, shining up from a grate. He creeps up to the edge and looks down.

Someone is looking back up at him.

He pulls back fast, reaching for the gun, but as his eyes process what he has just seen, he has to keep himself from laughing. He peers over the edge again.

Below him is a row of urinals, one being used by a man whose face is tipped upward, eyes closed in apparent enjoyment. As Simon watches, the man finishes his business and walks out.

Now, Simon tells himself, before you have a chance to think about it.

He pulls the grate out and hangs for a second by one hand as he gets the grate repositioned as well as he can. Then he drops to the floor and runs for the stalls--and makes it just in time. As he locks himself in, the door opens.

He can see feet, and an indistinct shape through the crack in the door.

A harsh voice says, "That you Kowalski?"

"No," Simon answers. He waits, tense, not knowing what else he can do. If this man sounds the alarm...it's all over. Maybe Mal or Jayne or Zoe could get through a whole station full of guards, but he knows he can't.

"Who is that? Carmichael? Somebody better be covering your post, you dumb shit."

For a second he blanks, can't get a word out. Thinks suddenly, what would Jayne say? Yes, obviously Jayne wouldn't say anything in this situation; he'd just break the man's neck, but--

"It's covered," Simon calls back. "I'm trying to take a dump here, is that suddenly against the rules?"

"Well, you don't have to take my head off. Christ, just asking a simple question here. If you *want* Viktor breathing down your neck..."

"I said it was covered."

There is deep sigh. "Fine, man. Hope so, for your sake. So, you seen Kowalski?"

"No."

"Well, if you do, tell him I'm looking for him." The feet retreat as the man keeps muttering. "Bunch of gorram kids, don't know nothing about discipline..."

As soon as the door closes, Simon is standing on the toilet, reaching for the grate above him. Up in the air duct, he calms his breathing and checks the blueprints for the thousandth time, orienting himself.

This duct runs parallel to the one he started out in. It will take him longer to get where he's going this way, and he doesn't have that much time to spare.

He checks his watch and stares for a second. Half an hour. It *couldn't* have been half an hour already. He starts moving, fast.

He refuses to check again, just keeps going, hands slipping and knees aching, knowing he's not going to make it. There's just not enough time. He's already supposed to *be* there, supposed to blowing Niska's head off right this second. Never going to make it, but he has to.

Light looms up ahead, reflecting off the top of the duct. He creeps forward and looks down.

He can see Mal on the opposite side of the room, being held back by one man while another rifles through a box on the floor.

A third man sits on the sofa--who the hell has a sofa in a torture chamber?--and this has to be Niska. He looks a bit different than he did in the photo, but the corpsified most definitely fits.

Simon can't see Mal's face, doesn't know how badly he's hurt or even if he's conscious. He can't shoot the man holding Mal. His aim isn't that good. He reaches for the gun anyway, cursing to himself silently. He has to do something. He was counting on there only being one guard.

The man not holding Mal, Niska's new torturer presumably, straightens up. He is holding a black tube with a triangular head.

Niska stands, moving a few steps closer to Mal. "You remember this, Mr. Reynolds? We were interrupted last time by your friends. So ill mannered. Not, I think, this time."

Simon recognizes the device immediately, and as Mal starts to struggle, Simon brings up the gun, presses it to a hole in the grate, aims, fires.

It takes him a second to even realize what he's done. He leans forward as the torturer falls to the ground and sees Mal elbowing the guard holding him, sees Niska going for a gun.

Simon aims for Niska, hoping Mal can take care of the other guard, but as he leans farther forward to get a better angle, the grate gives way under him.

He falls and hits the floor hard, pain shooting through his back. The gun flies out of his hand, and he scrambles after it, dazed. A foot comes down on his hand.

"Your friends are most resourceful, Mr. Reynolds, but--"

Simon shoves his hand up hard, grabbing hold of the only vital spot he can reach.

Niska's voice cuts off in a hoarse shriek, and Simon yanks his leg, dumping him on the floor, reaching for the gun again--and this time he gets it.

Scrambling back to the wall, aiming with shaking hands, he finally gets to his feet. Niska is up, too.

"Very resourceful indeed," Niska says through gritted teeth. He holds up his hands and kicks away the gun lying on the floor next to him. "Well, you go now, yes? I do nothing to stop you. And maybe next time...you join our game as well. Hm?"

Simon can see Niska's face crease with nauseating good humor over the barrel of the gun. Out of the corner of his eye, he is aware of Mal still struggling with the guard. Mal can't help him.

"Oh, come now. You would not shoot an old man. Unarmed, harmless... Surely not."

Simon takes a step forward, then another, telling himself he wants to be sure he won't miss.

"We are all civilized men here..."

He tunes Niska out, but it doesn't help. An old man, backing away from him, offering no threat-- The torturer dead on the floor, *dead* because Simon killed him with no thought or-- Dead. Because Simon killed him.

He knows he has to pull the trigger. He can't leave Niska alive, or they'll be going through this again in a week, a month, never knowing when, never knowing... But that man is dead on the floor, and Simon feels like he's going to be sick. He's frozen. His mind is empty, and Niska could walk up and pull the gun right out of his hands.

He remembers Mal telling him that someone would have to deal with Dobson, that it should be him, but Mal didn't think he had the guts. He remembers aiming at Dobson, knowing Mal was right, that he wouldn't be able to do it.

He prays for Niska to give him a reason, call for the guards, anything, any reason at all, but the old bastard is just *standing* there, and time is passing, and they still have to find Zoe...

He's about to give up, when a hand falls on his shoulder. His breath stops in his throat, and he tries to turn, sure that it's the torturer, not dead after all, but there's a hand now covering his own on the gun.

"Aim for me." Mal's voice is rough, and he is leaning on Simon heavily.

Simon has let the gun slip downward, but now he brings it up again, aiming between Niska's eyes.

Mal's finger slips over his own and pulls the trigger. Niska crumples to the floor, a red hole appearing in his forehead.

"Again," Mal says, and Simon aims again.

Three more bullets, and Niska's face doesn't even look like a face any more.

"Okay," Mal says. He breathes out in a sigh. "Okay."

Mal's hand falls away from the gun, and for a second Simon is supporting all of his weight, nearly crumpling to the floor under it. Then it's just Mal's hand on his shoulder again, holding tightly, but no more than that.

"We ought to get out of here," Mal says.

"Where's Zoe?"

"They took her back to the holding cell." Mal coughs and wipes blood away from his eyes. "He was going to make her watch, but she just kept staring at him. You know that look she gets."

"Like 'You're going to die a slow, painful death while I watch'?"

"That's the one. I think it was creeping him out."

"Where's the holding cell?" Not far, he prays. Let it not be far. He can almost feel the second hand of his watch ticking away the time.

"Downstairs. They took us up in an elevator. We were blindfolded, but I think it's in Niska's office."

"Can you walk? We don't have much time." He gets no response, and Mal's gaze is wandering across the opposite wall, unseeing. "Mal?"

Blue eyes snap back to his, and Mal looks like he's coming back from somewhere. "Simon? Are you here all by yourself?"

"They're waiting for us downstairs. Are you all right?"

He was assuming Mal couldn't be hurt too badly if he took out that guard, but maybe he was wrong. He runs his hands over Mal's skull, finding a bump on the back, but no blood. He looks at Mal's pupils, sees nothing abnormal. He holds up a finger.

"Can you follow this?"

Mal slaps his hand away. "I'm fine, just dizzy. Can't see straight. They doped us with something. Wore off real fast with Zoe. Not so fast with me."

"All right." He studies Mal's face, but Mal really does look all right. Beat up, bruised, cut, but the injuries appear superficial. "Come on. We should hurry."

He nods jerkily and gets an arm around Simon's shoulders. As they walk toward the door, Simon feels himself pulled momentarily tighter against Mal's side.

"Sure am glad to see you," Mal says.

Simon smiles to himself and covers Mal's hand with his own. "Same here."

The elevator is in Niska's office. There is no call button, only a palm scanner.

"Shit," Mal mutters.

Simon presses the gun into Mal's hand and leans him up against the wall. Runs back to the torture chamber. He hears Mal calling after him as he picks up a cleaver from the selection of unpleasant knives now scattered across the floor by the struggle. He's dealt with bodies before, he reminds himself.

He returns to find Mal squinting at the door, his aim wavering badly. Mal holds the gun out to him.

"Take it. Is that what I think it is?"

Simon takes the gun and gives him Niska's hand in return.

Mal presses it to the scanner. The doors slide open, and Mal moves to toss the hand away.

"Don't. We might need it later."

Mal gives him an unreadable look, but steps into the elevator after him, complete with hand. "Downright sinister," Simon hears him mutter.

"How far down?"

"Two levels," Mal says.

The elevator beeps twice, and the doors open.

"Don't fucking move, either of you!"

Simon turns to Mal, ignoring the ring of armed men. "I thought that room was soundproofed."

"Far as I know, it is."

"And the door was shut."

"So how did they hear the shots? Got me."

"Shots?" one of the guards says.

Simon looks at him, and it takes only a second to remember his face from the shuttle.

"What are you saying?" Viktor pulls Mal out and shoves him against the wall, hand around his throat. "Talk!"

Mal grins at him. "Your boss is dead, Viktor. It is Viktor, right? I don't think we've been formally introduced."

Viktor's face freezes, and Simon can see the grip on Mal's neck ease fractionally. He figures this is his cue to do something.

The guards don't seem to see him as a threat. Their weapons are trained on him, but all of them are watching Viktor and Mal. Simon reaches behind him. Wedged between railing and wall, where Mal stuck it before he was pulled out, is Niska's hand.

"Viktor?" Simon waits until the man looks over at him. "Catch."

Everyone takes a step back, and Viktor is staring in shock at what he has in his hands, and that's enough. Mal slides down the wall, grabbing an assault rifle from the nearest guard, and Simon ducks back into the elevator. On the full automatic setting there isn't much need to aim.

"Well," Mal says. "They sure as hell heard that."

They move down the hall as fast as Mal can manage, passing unmarked doors and finally peering around a corner. They can see Zoe behind a wall of glass, guarded by a single man. The guy is looking nervously up and down the hall every few seconds. Even from this far away Simon can see the sweat on his face.

"Looks a mite twitchy," Mal says softly.

"Any ideas?"

Mal sighs. "Not a one."

Simon takes a deep breath and calls out, "Hey, Kowalski, I could use some help here!"

Mal looks at him like he's insane, and Simon would be prepared to admit that this might be the case.

After a pause they hear a voice call back uncertainly. "I'm not Kowalski. He's up on--"

"Yeah, I give a fuck who you are. Just get over here. This thing's heavy!"

"Carmichael?"

"If I drop it, I'm making sure Viktor knows why!"

Footsteps hurry toward them, and as the man rounds the corner Mal takes him out with one punch.

Mal looks up from the prone body to meet Simon's eyes and grins. "Come on, Carmichael. We got some rescuing to do."

Zoe is happy to see them, and Simon is even happier to hand over the gun.

Back the way they came there are shouts and the sound of running feet.

"Which way?" Mal asks. "And I hope to hell it ain't back that way."

"Forward. We're close."

Simon gets Mal's arm around his shoulders, and Zoe brings up the rear. She hasn't said a word since they got her out of the cell, but she's definitely wearing the 'going to kill you slow' look.

Shots ring out ahead of them.

"Keep going," Simon pants. "That's them."

He's late, so late. He doesn't even look at his watch. He doesn't want to know how long they've been holding their position, or at what cost.

Twenty feet from the next corner, which ought to be the last. Ten. Five.

Someone barrels around the corner toward them. Mal swings the barrel of his weapon up, ready to shoot.

"Whoa! Hey!"

Simon knocks it away just in time, and bullets march across the wall.

"Hell of a greeting," Jayne grumbles. "You're late. I was coming to get you."

"Jayne!"

Simon looks around, but it's no one here who said that. It sounded like--

"Wash," Zoe says. She accelerates past all of them and disappears around the corner.

Jayne and Mal look at each other and start forward, Simon still bracing Mal as well as he can.

"Don't let me shoot anyone I'd regret shooting later," Mal says quietly. "Still can't see too good."

As they turn the corner, Mal and Jayne both flatten themselves to opposite sides of the wall and start shooting. Simon can't see anyone he recognizes, including Zoe. Jayne rolls a grenade toward the guards, gesturing for Simon and Mal to take cover.

The explosion clears a temporary path, and they run through smoke and burning bodies. Someone grabs Simon's ankle as he passes, and he jerks away so hard that Mal ends up supporting him for a second. A grateful look is all he has time for. Once the smoke clears, the scene in front of them demands all their attention.

Wash is down, with Zoe at his side. She is firing at the approaching wall of armed men, but they are holding riot shields in front of them, and all she is doing is wasting bullets. Book is picking a few off with precise shots at feet and ankles, but there are too many, and they're coming fast.

Simon can see the hole cut in the deck maybe ten feet beyond Wash and Zoe. It leads to Serenity and safety, but they aren't going to make it before they're cut off. The men aren't firing now, but bullet holes cover the floor around the hole and lead up to where Wash is lying. They won't be allowed to get any closer.

Then, as Zoe's ammunition runs out, Simon hears a noise above the stomp of booted feet.

There is the sharp sound of glass breaking, a pop and a hiss, and now the guards are faltering as a thick purple smoke rises behind them.

"Ignore it," one of the men barks. "Just a smoke grenade. Keep going."

They keep going. One step, two steps, and then the first man falls.

"What the hell," Mal mutters.

Another man is down, two, five, more than Simon can keep track of. The rest are looking wildly for an enemy they can't find.

Mal nods to Jayne, and the three of them move cautiously forward. They hit the deck as a guard starts firing randomly before collapsing. The men are yelling unintelligibly, and the purple smoke is creeping forward.

They reach Wash and Zoe, and Jayne slings Wash over his shoulder. Mal takes another look at the confusion of falling men and roiling smoke.

"Run," he says.

One eye on the guards, they run for the hole. Book is on point with his rifle aimed, but the few guards still standing don't even seem to see them.

Jayne, with Wash, is the first back into the ship, then Zoe.

"Go," Book says. "I'll cover you."

Mal jerks his head sharply to the hole. "Get down there."

Book wavers, but obeys. Mal and Simon are left alone. Simon knows what they're waiting for. He wonders if Mal does.

A space suited figure walks through the swirl of smoke and the tangle of still bodies. Mal must know because he doesn't even bother to raise his gun.

River takes her helmet off and looks down at them. "Time to go home."

"How did you--" Simon starts.

"Later," Mal says. "In the ship. Now."

River is first down the hole, and Simon goes next without argument. Mal seals the hatch behind them and turns to River.

"What was that stuff?"

"No touching guns," River says solemnly.

Mal sighs. "Well, I'm glad to see you've taken that to heart, but it don't answer my question."

"Nalcyn gas, I think." Simon waits for River's nod before he continues. "We had the makings in the infirmary."

"She could do that? Put that together?"

"It's a simple formula. I've done it before by accident."

"Put everyone to sleep," River says. "Asleep on their plates. Mother said if it was soup they would have drowned."

Mal looks at Simon with a raised eyebrow, and Simon can feel his face grow hot.

"A miscalculation in a chemical formula. During a dinner party." He gives River a quelling glance. "I was only eleven."

Mal snorts. "Gotta say, Doc, I don't envy your folks." He turns to River. "You go change out of that suit and put it back where you found it. I think our next talk's going to be on the subject of going EVA without permission."

Rivers looks up at him, smiling faintly. "You're welcome, Captain."

She heads off toward the cargo bay, and Simon turns to leave as well. He still wants to know what Mal seems to be overlooking, namely how River got behind those guards in the first place, but that will have to wait until later. He has at least one patient waiting for him, and he thinks Book might have been hit as well.

He gets only two steps before Mal's hand closes on his arm, pulling him back hard.

"What?"

Mal's grip on his arm eases, and his expression softens, and Simon finds himself expecting...something. He can't say what.

"You shouldn't have come," is all Mal says. "You could've got killed."

Simon has to close his eyes, just for a second. He wasn't expecting any declarations, but...

"I had to."

He sees something shift in Mal's face, and fingers dig into his arm in a brief, convulsive clutch.

"Simon..."

He waits, and seconds stretch between them.

In the end, Mal drops his eyes and steps back.

"You'd better get going. You've got patients to see to."

Simon nods numbly and turns away.

***

Simon has removed three bullets from Wash and one from Book. Book is back in his room, but Wash needs observation, so Simon is still in the infirmary, observing.

Mal came in an hour or so back, quiet and subdued, to have his wounds cleaned and bandaged. He stayed afterward, sitting quietly on the bench and finally falling asleep there.

Simon sits on a stool between Wash and Mal, watching over both of them. He is looking at Mal's face, as troubled in sleep as in waking. He is starting to drift off himself.

He doesn't notice that River is even in the room until she drops down to sit on the floor in front of him. She loops an arm around his leg, and he strokes her hair.

"It's all right, mei mei. Everyone's going to be fine." An automatic reassurance, for she only comes to him like this when things are bad.

There is a long silence before she replies. "You died, didn't you? Just like me."

He thinks of the sickness he has been carrying inside him since he shot the torturer, and this time he knows what she means.

"Yes."

"I didn't want you to."

"I know." He can't think of what else to say, and he is so tired.

"The death card signifies change."

"Death card?"

"The hanged man is sacrifice. The star is hope. You got all of them, but they're just cards. It doesn't mean anything." She turns to look up at him, and her face is twisted with distress. "It doesn't mean anything, Simon, they're just cards!" A tear spills onto her cheek. "Contradictions and faulty symbolism. I didn't want you to die."

He pulls her up to sit in his lap, wrapping her in his arms as if he can protect her. From anything.

He looks at Mal over the top of her head as she presses her face against his chest.

Two days, perhaps, until he can be sure Wash is out of danger. Two more days on Serenity.

He told Kaylee that River was more at home here than anywhere she'd ever been. He didn't realize that the same was true for him.

He doesn't want to leave.

He thinks about what would have happened to River if he hadn't come back today. He can picture Inara taking on the responsibility of caring for her...but where? Not on Serenity. Without Mal, without Zoe, there could be no Serenity.

No real home for either of them, drifting from place to place. He knows Inara can barely pay the rent on her shuttle as it is. And River would get worse. Without her treatments, she'd get worse fast, sink into the chaos of her own mind and never come out again. It would only be a matter of time before she wandered off on her own, got picked up by the authorities, and then right back to the Alliance.

And that would be it. No one to save her. The rest of her life--however long that might last--spent in pain as they continued their experiments.

River has to be his first priority.

What he did today, however necessary, was selfish. It wasn't just his own life he was risking; it was River's.

The problem is that he would do it again, wouldn't be able to help it. So he has to leave. Leave Serenity. Leave Mal. Leave these people, this new family behind.

He wonders how it can be so much harder to leave these people whom he has know only a few months than it was to leave his own parents.

"Doc?"

He looks up. Zoe is standing in the door, looking worried. Of course she's worried. Her husband got shot. Simon puts his thoughts away for the moment. For now, he is still Serenity's doctor. He has patients and responsibilities. For now.

"Is everything all right?" he asks her.

"There's no pursuit." She looks to Wash's still form on the exam table. "Is he...?"

"He'll have an uncomfortable time until the wounds heal, but it's not life-threatening."

She nods. "Thanks."

"Just doing my job."

"Don't think it was in your job description to break into the skyplex and bust us out. Thanks for that, too."

"You're welcome."

"You want to take a break, get some rest? I can watch these two."

"You must need to sleep more than I do."

"I slept in the cell."

He gapes at her for a moment. "Of course," he says at last. Of course she did. In Niska's hands, with Mal upstairs being tortured, knowing she was going to be next... Unbelievable. "Thank you. I'll do that."

"Hey, before you wake her," Zoe says, nodding to River, who Simon is reasonably sure is not asleep at all. "How did she get behind those guys?"

River lifts her head. "Garbage hatch." She looks at Simon. "Much more efficient. It was right there on your blueprints."

He hears Zoe's quiet laughter and sighs.

"You couldn't have mentioned this a little sooner?"

-------
..end..

Continue to Off the Map.