“Oh, you’re back.” Inara was surprised to see Zoe and Kaylee in the sitting room of their suite, having an obviously deep and meaningful conversation. “Is it that time already?” She glanced at the clock, but that seemed to be wrong.

“We ... uh ... came back early,” Kaylee said, twisting her hair around her finger. “Wondered where you’d got to.”

“Oh, I just ... went for a walk.” Saffron was more than willing to talk, Inara had found out, particularly when the ex-Companion had used her wiles on her bodyguards and insisted they order tea and some of those delicious pastries, and now she knew rather more than she needed about some of the jobs the redhead had pulled. “I needed some fresh air.”

“Did it help?” Zoe asked.

“Excuse me?”

“With your headache?”

“Oh, yes. It’s completely gone.” Inara looked around the room. “Where are the others?”

Kaylee’s wide eyes seemed to glow. “Well, Phoebe’s in her room, Flynn’s ... well, I'm not actually sure where he is, ‘cause he stormed off when we got back, and Frey’s talking to Val.”

“Talking?”

“Mmn.” Kaylee glanced at Zoe, then giggled, hiding her mouth behind her hand.

“What about? And why did Flynn storm off?”

“Well ...”

“There’s something going on here I don't know about, isn’t there?”

“Could be.”

“Did everyone come back early?”

“No,” Zoe explained. “Just us. Kaylee made faces at the shuttle pilot and got him to bring us up ahead of time.”

“I did not!” the young mechanic blustered. “I just asked.”

“Really.”

“Can I help it if the puppy-dog eyes worked even better on him than on the Cap’n?”

“That’s only because he lets you get away with it.”

“That’s ‘cause I’m his mei-mei .” Kaylee sounded extremely satisfied.

Inara was beginning to feel frustrated. “Can someone please tell me what’s going on?” she demanded, her hands on her hips.

This time Zoe smiled, the slow grin that indicated something had amused her greatly. “Well ...”

A little while before, down on Aegis …

In the darkness