Jayne had his tongue just millimeters from the pretty girl’s neck when he heard the scream. He froze, not in apprehension, but rather curiosity, and listened. The pretty girl leaned back, rubbing against him. The sounds of serving trays, howling drunks, and mediocre music folded around him, urging him to sink back into the fantasy of his lust. No one else had paused to listen. No one else had heard.

He sank his teeth into the pretty blonde’s shoulder, dismissing the sound as a ghost from a past job. Her hands were all over him, sending his blood pumping. She was leading him to a secluded broom closet when he heard the scream again. Something urgent. He needed to explore. The pretty girl ignored his attempts to detach himself from her. Frustrated, he finally picked her up, carried her to the broom closet, and closed her inside by herself, promising he’d be back soon. Adjusting his belt, and redirecting his blood to his brain, he trotted down the stairs into the dusty world, already dimmed by the sun’s retreat. Hand tracing the butt of his gun, he listened for the scream again. Or a muffled cry. Anything to justify him leaving that pretty whore alone in a broom closet.

He knew if there was one sound he could hear even through the roar of a hundred space ship engines, if there was one sound he’d run through the gnashing teeth of a legion of Reavers to calm, it was Kaylee’s scream.

*~*

Kaylee bit the hand covering her mouth, letting loose a muffled scream. She kicked her legs wildly in the air, her hand gripping her assailant, trying desperately to keep her head from being ripped off her neck. He’d come at her from behind, just as the dusk became dark enough for street lamps, dragged her into an ally that smelled of urine and stale fish, and thrown her against the brick wall, busting the skin on her temple.

Kaylee let loose a piercing scream of bloody-murder and that was when his hand had covered her mouth. He lifted her bodily into the air, and shoved her against a sticky green dumpster. Her forehead