Part J

You know, to a certain extent, I can hardly believe it was that easy," Simon said later in the infirmary aboard Firefly. Technically, according to both ship's time and the local Bellerophon clock at the mansion it was the next day, but nobody had really gotten much sleep in the night, with the exception of Kaylee, who was still deeply in dreamland. Nobody had wanted to move her out of Inara's shuttle, especially Inara herself.

"She looks so cute, all dressed up in that fancy black evening gown, her hair done to the nines, and snoring so enthusiastically," Inara had commented, and even Simon had to agree.

"HEY!" Mal exclaimed, in response to Simon's comment, and Simon blushed, realizing how his remark might have sounded.

"Okay, yes, on one level I realize that this doesn't qualify as easy, even though as gunshots go, it won't be a terribly tough one to recover from, especially if you listen to doctors' orders," he admitted, returning to his examination of the stitching that he'd performed on the shuttle, after recovering from the stun weapon and finding a medical kit that was in somewhat better shape than the one that Kaylee taken with them to Bellerophon for him to use in an emergency. "But still - I mean, there are a lot of complications that didn't arise, that might have. Do the feds still not even realize that we were there?"

"Not sure what they realize, I admit," Mal said, covering himself up somewhat since Simon wasn't telling him that he had to keep his newest developing scar, (a bit uncomfortably close to the crotch area,) available for further study. "Inara's presence there, at least, was on official record."

"Won't somebody ask her for a statement, then?"

"No." Mal smiled with satisfaction. "She relayed a message back about how she was taking herself, and her client, to safety because of the disturbance - she wouldn't have been the only guest to panic if that had really been her motivation, and probably most of them weren't even polite enough to say so. And it would be a rare