I own nothing.

----

Jayne had been missing for three days before anyone took River seriously. Mal felt especially bad about that. They'd known River to be a Reader for some time now, and relied on her talents more and more since Miranda, but they still had trouble learning to listen when they weren't on a job. Maybe if Mal had listened... well, maybes and mayflies, as his mother used to say. Now was the time for action.

If only Jayne had been taken by the Feds, maybe for Drunk and Disorderly or something. Mal almost felt like laughing for a moment, because of wishing the Feds had gotten one of his crew, but the Blue Hands - Blue Sun - were worse. The Purplebellies had rules, at least, even if they didn't all stick to them. The Blue Sun Corporation, on the other hand, had only one law - profit - and viewed all other laws as mere guidelines, if that.

And so he, Zoë, Simon and River found themselves planning to break into the Academy, while Kaylee tended to the engine and Inara manned the helm.

"There are several entrances that I was told about; here, here and here," Simon said, pointing to three places on the blueprint he'd brought out from his cabin. "This one comes out closest to the-"

"Wrong," said River, not looking away from the window.

Simon looked at River. "Why wrong?"

"Conspirators were caught. Guards changed. They know all the entrances now."

"All of them?" Zoë said. "Even the ones Simon doesn't know?"

"All of them," River confirmed. "They've posted guards, given them our names, faces, everything. I could possibly get past them, but I could never get him out on my own. Any of you could get him out, but you couldn't get in."

"They didn't want to just taunt us by letting us know," Mal said after a moment of contemplation. "There ain't no profit in it."

River smiled. "You're learning."

"So... what did they want?" said Simon.

"Me."

Mal waited for the explosion of protest - but it didn't come. Come to think of it, most of the protesters weren't eve