At quarter past eleven the next day, River and her party were already waiting in a large private booth at the Draco Etamin tavern. Jayne hadn't recovered enough to make the trip, to his disappointment, (though he hadn't stubbornly contested his doctor's orders more than once,) and he had stoically refused to let anyone else stay aboard Serenity to keep him company - therefore, the group was made up of River herself, Simon, Kayle, and Zoe.

The tavern was fairly busy and noisy, however a number of these booths seemed to have been constructed with soundproofing in mind - probably a reason that Garcia had suggested meeting here. Zoe had even used a bug detector on the table and seats, the walls of the small alcove that they all sat in, and had found no signs of outside observation. So they waited.

"Wonder when the captain and Inara will be getting back here," Kaylee said in a soft voice. "Didn't think that they'd have to stay long up on the moon."

"Well, Inara's friend probably wants to show them proper hospitality," Zoe pointed out, "especially in light of what happened on their way there. A little crashland and some backpacking may not seem like much of a big deal to us, but to some settled Companion lady, it must seem like they nearly died." Simon choked slightly at that sentiment. "Well, I know that they could have died in the crash, but - you know."

"Yeah, I guess I do," Simon muttered. River knew that he wouldn't be sanguine about Mal and Inara until they were back on Serenity and he could check over their blood himself - or something like that.

"So, River," Kaylee said, a bit too brightly, trying to change the subject. "You said that you met a guy yesterday? What's he like?"

"Umm... actually, I just picked him up because I needed a ride out of the city," River admitted, "but he was kinduv cool. Around my age, really smart, and his name is... oh, wait." Something that had been nagging at River suddenly snapped into focus - somebody crossing the room towards them.

"Unusual name," Zoe joked.