I

“She always did love to dance,” he said with a smile as River moved gracefully through the now-empty cargo bay. Her hands and feet moved in perfect synch, and she seemed to glide from one pose into the next, her movements so effortless and sure that he couldn’t help but think of a silk scarf, rippling in the wind.

Kaylee stood beside him on the steel catwalk above the cargo bay, their hips and shoulders touching. Kaylee leaned into the doc comfortably and smiled down at River. The teenager was rocking back and forth on her heels, her hands pushing an invisible ball through the recycled air of the hold. “Wish I could move like that, she’s so graceful,” Kaylee said wistfully. “Though I can’t never recall seeing a dance as looked like that before.”

There was a rustle of silk from the starboard side of the ship, and the two of them turned to see Inara step down on to the catwalk. “That’s because it isn’t a dance,” she told them with a smile. “Not exactly. It’s actually a form of martial arts. Watch how she moves her body and hands. Now, imagine her moving at three or four times that speed – see how she is rolling with a blow, and then throwing her opponent when she moves her hips like that?”

The three of them looked down at River, Simon and Kaylee now watching the movements of her hands and feet with a new appreciation. They didn’t even look up when there was a regular tread of boots on metal behind them. “Martial arts forms, huh?” Zoë asked as she, too, leaned over the rail to watch. “I used to do a bit of that, a long time ago. Don’t know that one she’s doing down there, though – wonder what style she’s using…”

“It’s all very impressive and somesuch,” Jayne groused from the galley door, “but it ain’t gonna be worth much of nothing ‘gainst some hundan with a piece.” He took a bite out of the freeze-dried grain bar he had stolen from the pantry and ambled on over, watching curiously as River began twirling about with her legs moving in graceful, sweeping crescent kicks.

“Oh, I would