All the usual caveats and addendums. This one takes place two days after the end of Heart of Gold. It contains spoilers for that episode. If you seen the episode or read the script, you probably have a pretty good guess what this is about. This started out as a snippet for the ff_friday challenge. The subject was Games. But somehow, along the way, it got too big for the challenge.

No More Games

Mal had been stewing for two days now. It was time to go confront the woman and get some things off his chest. Kaylee had just asked him why he had been so cranky lately and he hadn’t had the heart to tell her the reason. Anyway, she wanted to leave; it was her job to tell the rest of the crew, not his. Gorram woman. Yep, it was more than past time to have it all out in the open. He stalked off to Inara’s shuttle pushing Jayne and Book out of the way in the hall without even noticing they were there.

As he barged in, he said, "Inara, how’s about we don’t play any more games."

"Good morning to you too, Mal. What can I do for you?" As usual, Inara looked calm and composed. He suspected she didn’t feel that way inside, but he’d take calm and composed over screaming any day, so he guessed he shouldn’t bitch about it even though that, too, was a game of sorts.

"I know you don’t particularly want to talk about this, but I mean to have my say. It would be a kindness if you let me say what I need to with no interruptions. Then you can say whatever you feel is necessary and we can get this all out in the open."

The only thing that betrayed her upset, a slight tightening of her lips. Internally she struggled for control before replying. "I’ve told you I’m leaving, Mal. I don’t see where there is anything else to discuss. But go ahead, since I know you will anyway."

"If there was nothing more to discuss, you would have told me where to drop you off and you would have told the rest of the crew you were leaving. Seems to me that means you ain’t really serious; just using this an excuse to get me all riled up, so I