Inara walked into the kitchen with a mission. She was going to find Mal, and she was going to get him to accept her help in finding Dillon Saunders. She couldn’t believe he hadn’t come to her already. All right, so it took lying awake all night to think of it, but Mal was supposed to think of things like this immediately! Her license may have been suspended, but she still had access to her Cortex files, and her passcodes should still work on the net.

So she would help find Saunders, and thereby find River, and she would get to spend some time with the Captain and figure out how to deal with whatever had changed between them.

Inara was surprised to find Mal sitting with Jayne, silent and contemplative. Both men were frowning slightly, staring off into the distance. The Companion (they could take away her license, but they couldn’t take away who she was) sat down smoothly. She waited for Mal to look up, and lifted her chin.

“I can help you,” she said softly.

“How, ‘Nara,” he said tiredly. “Your license… you won’t get us what you did.” She winced inside. She knew he wasn’t trying to be cruel. He almost never did. It just happened.

“Maybe not physically. But I have access to all my files, and I have passcodes that won’t have been changed. I can find out things that you wouldn’t be able to without bullets and threats.” Memory clanged: she’d said something like that when she’d first rented the shuttle. He closed his eyes, squinting them hard. She wondered if he’d slept that night.

“Not dragging you into this. I ain’t gonna give them cause to lay some more charges on you, get your license permanently revoked. Point of fact, maybe it’d be best for you to get off before we go chasin’ Saunders. You’n Kaylee, and the Doc if he wants.” Inara did not falter.

“I am not leaving the ship, Mal. I can’t speak for Kaylee or for Simon, but I will not leave Serenity. And if you refuse to give me leave to help find River, I will do it without your permission. I may not be a soldier, but I am not weaponless.” He si