Deafening silence followed River’s departure. It was a full half minute before the tension broke and Mal clicked the safety on his weapon.

“River!” Simon called, running to the back door in chase. Mal caught the back of his shirt. He struggled and punched, but Mal ducked easily.

“You, tend Sky,” he ordered, keeping his voice low and firm. Jayne was already kneeling next to his wife, dabbing her face with his glove to get a better sense of where the blood was coming from.

Mal went to the back door and looked out, but River had already disappeared into the foothills. Zoë came next to him, and Mal caught her before she could run out.

“She’s going east, toward the fires,” Zoë said quickly, craning her neck to see out the door.

“You can’t know that for sure,” Mal said.

Zoë took a step back, squaring her shoulders militantly, replacing her careless urgency with sagacious calm. “I hit her with a tracking dart.”

Zoë held up a GPS handheld and pointed to the dot indicating the fleeing River. Impressed, but grim, Mal gathered as much reason and wit as he could, and enough courage to let Zoë fly on her own.

“Follow her,” Mal said. “You and Jayne.”

Zoë looked at him, awestruck, but there was no time for a pep talk now. She had been preparing for this job her whole life.

Mal summoned Jayne with a shout and a wave, and within seconds, they had gathered the gear they needed. Jayne kept looking back at Sky, but Mal tapped his arm, and Jayne changed his focus to the task at hand.

“See where she’s going and what she’s up to,” Mal ordered, testing the batteries in the radio before handing it to Zoë. “Track, but do not engage.”

They left, and Mal locked the door behind them. This was not his best day ever.

-----

Jayne was getting too old for this – tracking a young, vibrant, thoroughly possessed woman across the foothills of Kerry, thick with smoke. One day he would convince Mal to retire to a paradise planet so they could live out their days as old men… or at least as old fathers.

He rem