Disclaimer: All of Firefly belongs to Joss Whedon

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Jayne hates it when people look down on him. It rides him and irks him like nothing in the ‘verse can.

The problem is, on Serenity, he’s worked himself to the “looked down” place as the ship’s muscle for hire.

Hell, he knows he does plenty of stupid things, he just wishes some would tell him when he’s made an ass of himself. At least the doctor has enough sense to do that.

But like the look the captain gave him this morning after he asked if Kaylee was mad….Or when Mal looked at him funny when he completed Badger’s sentence with “pretentious” – yeah Mal, he has a vocabulary that consists more of “gose” and “gorramit.”

By today Jayne has had enough with the stupid routine. So as Mal takes Kaylee to his fancy party, Jayne heads back to town and into a bookstore. The clerk there is some soft-hands-clean-suit-glasses type like the doc, and he is startled by mercenary’s appearance.

Jayne gruffly slaps a small handful of coins on the counter and narrows his eyes on the clerk.

“I need all the books I can buy with this that’ll make me smart.”