"I charged him 50 credits for his supper last night, but Zoe made me give it back to him." Only Jayne Cobb could manage to pout in a manly fashion. "Said his meals was covered in the fare."

"So, no real problems, other than ethical ones?" Simon smiled to take the sting out of his words, and he was in too good a mood to berate the mercenary for being true to his nature.

"Naw. Smooth sailing. We got paid some pretty coin and your sis put us in the sky, easy as lyin'. We're shiny, so long as we don't go to flyin' into a moon, or some such." He didn't sound very concerned at that prospect.

The crew-folk were gathered in the common room. They had all had a quick meal after River and Mal had put them on a course (Zoe had found something urgent to do in the cargo bay, but Inarra had kept them company- and looked over their shoulders) for Beaumonde. The meal hadn't been fancy, just a little protein gussied up to pretend it was the real deal, but it ate, and the company was good. A little less with the laughter and funny tales, but that was to be expected.

Meal over, the crew sat around the big, heavy table. Probably some of them were thinking of another time, just after Book died, and just before Wash was to die. A Council of War. They had uncovered a secret that the Alliance had killed, murdered wholesale, to try to cover up. The crew of Serenity shook the pillars of Heaven that day.

It was amazing, really, that they all were still alive, and free.

River focused on the whirl of the wood in the great table. It was like a fingerprint of the tree, which had lived and died since humanity left Earth That Was. At the same time, River was doing the math. Nine minus two, was seven. Seven plus one, what was seven plus one?

This was not the first time she had met an unborn person. During her time on Serenity, she had assisted, in her way, Simon and Inarra in the delivery of a baby boy. There had been one other time, one of the few good memories from that place of torture, a woman in her second trimeste