Indigo MacCready. Nobody knew if Indigo was his real name, or just something somebody on some moon had christened him with because of the number and variety of his tattoos, but that’s what everyone called him, from the women in his bed to the men at the end of his guns. He wore two pistols, slung low on his hips, the leather of the holsters slightly greasy from constant use. He never told anyone when he was born, but he looked the kind of man who’d reached his forties and just stayed there. He could have been sixty, and nobody could tell the difference, although it was probably nearer to the latter since Jayne had met him more than nearly thirty years before.

The ex-mercenary settled back in his chair at the table, and sighed. “Like I said, he was the man who taught me how not to get dead. Which wasn’t easy. There’re times I think I was greener than the doc here when I left Ezra, working my passage on anything that’d have me, doing pretty much anything, including cleaning the bilges on a regular basis.”

Simon didn’t bother to complain – it wasn't like Jayne was being deliberately insulting, just giving in to the habit. Still, the look on his face was slightly pained, although that eased when Kaylee slipped her hand into his.

“So you weren’t a gunhand in the beginning,” Zoe said slowly.

“Nah. I was hardly old enough to shave, let alone be taken seriously. It took a year or two before I filled out to match my height, and I was nineteen before I actually worked as a merc.” He shook his head. “Nearly didn’t make it to twenty,” he admitted. “Blind luck … and Indigo.”

“How?” Mal asked.

“You mean how’d I meet him?” Jayne actually smiled. “We was on the wrong side of each other, and his partner at the time was all for killing me, just to make a point. Indigo persuaded him not to, saying it was pro-fessional courtesy. Anyway, they got the loot, I got tossed, and was down to my uppers when Indigo walked back into the saloon I was drowning my sorrows in.” He paused a moment. “I do