Truth is, what happened was this ...

It was real easy. She was going back to the Training House, and we were gonna just go. Out into the Black. Flyin’ like we were supposed to, free and clear. Not sure how it came to be so complicated, but ... maybe albatross could explain it, but I sure as diyu can’t.

And I never meant it to happen. Honest.

Kaylee swore it wasn’t her fault, just that the men came with the tanker to refill our water reservoirs an hour before they were supposed to, and she didn’t realise anyone was working in the shower. Nor that the head wasn’t working to its best capacity, which I’d taken upon myself to fix.

And it wasn’t my fault that we had cattle as cargo again. Personally I figure that was Badger, telling Sir Warwick that of course we were happy to carry ‘em again, and only at double the last rate. And Jayne’d used all the water we had left in cleaning out the bay, and the very last cupful sluicing down his boots. So I’d figured it wasn’t worth turning off the stopcock.

She came up, all prettified, asking if there’s anything she can do, since she felt responsible for mentioning the fault as we, her and me, that is, cleared up the last of breakfast. So I’m asking her to pass me the wrench, ‘cause I’ve got my hands all twisted round backwards up above myself, and she steps inside the stall with me so I can get hold of it, and that’s the moment, the exact moment, the tanker starts its engines.

Just a second until I could manage to turn it off, but with the shower head dangling like it was, that’s all it took. We were soaked. And it was so rutting cold. As I turned to look at her, my mouth open, water dripping from my nose, I could see it was. Very clearly through the thin fabric of her dress, clinging to her like it wasn’t hardly there, two little peaks drawing my gaze and giving me absolute proof that it was, honestly, cold. I was about to make a joke, something tasteless I wouldn’t be surprised, something with more than a hint of snark. Until I looked