Chapter Summary: An evolution of a relationship lost, found, and lost again. They're the same people even when they're not, aren't they? Always soldiers. [pre-series alternate reality]

~*~

I. Going to the Wars

---

Tell me not, sweet, I am unkind,

That from the nunnery of thy chaste breast and quiet mind,

To war and arms I fly

---

"Sergeant, don't be a fool--your leg isn't the most stablest of attachments right now. It's liable to rip right off if you don't-- keep--- still!" The doctor pushed back tendrils of dark, curling hair as she passed a bloody hand over her forehead, frowning down at the pins keeping the sergeant's knee in place.

Working the pins into submission, she mused wryly, had almost been as difficult as Sergeant Mal Reynolds could be.

"Don't much need a leg, Inara," Mal replied, oblivious to her exasperation. He winced as the doc plunged a needle in his hip. "Just a--"

"--just a gun and an arm to shoot it with, yes, I know. I've heard it before--from men with missing appendages. Now lie still or I will make you lie still!" Inara leveled her best glare down at the handsome man whose leg had just nearly been blown off.

Mal leered, a vivid smear of red marring his stubbled cheek. "You gonna wrassle with me, doc?"

Inara shook her head. "No, I'm going to save your leg," she said evenly. Then she held up the needle and smiled grimly. "Doped you," she explained, at his questioning look. "Only way to shut you up."

Explosions suddenly rocked the dusty, uneven ground beneath them both, the thunderous boom adding to the gunshots and shouting soldiers all around. Green laser-light zipped through the air, and plumes of fire unfurled hundreds of feet into the sky, bright flames practically licking the stars. A few battle-cruisers zoomed overhead, and the low drone followed by another explosion made Inara's mouth tighten in barely-repressed anxiety.

Her usually crisp white uniform was dirt-streaked and torn, her entire front stained a deep