Chapter 9

Jayne was sitting on his weights bench, holding one of his dumbbells but not doing anything with it. Instead he was staring into space, his mind about as blank as he could make it. The cat ... panther, he corrected himself before grimacing, had wandered off, ‘pparently bored with torturing him, although part of his hindbrain was still listening out, just in case.

Cat – the real one – wasn’t anywhere to be seen either. Which might be more dangerous.

It was times like this Jayne missed the Preacher most. Book’s advice, whether they were spotting each other lifting weights or hanging around a gunfight, while rooted in morals more often than not was at least always relevant. Trouble was, seeing that cat ... panther playing with short stub and the other kids had him wondering if maybe he was wrong. He still didn’t trust any of these strangers, not as far as he could spit (which was, to be honest, quite a distance, and, hell, he had half a dozen guns about his person right now, didn’t he?) but could someone Bethie liked be all bad? Except the kid was only eight, so what did she know?

“Oh, sorry.”

Jayne looked up. It was the young man, Declan, a towel over his shoulder. He was wearing a pair of Hank’s pants and what looked like one of Simon’s singlets.

“Yeah?”

“I ... was just going to do some reps.”

“Yeah?”

“I mean, if you don’t mind. I’m finding it hard to sleep, and I thought some exercise might tire me out."

Jayne, who had been having the same problem, shrugged. “Sure. Go ahead.” He stood up, placing the dumbbell back in the rack. “You want me to spot yah?”

Declan looked surprised. “I ... yeah, that would be good.” He watched Jayne stack the weights on the bar, and felt his stomach drop.

Above them, on the catwalk outside the shuttle, River lay face down, staring through the grill, watching her husband take the first, tentative steps to acceptance, while listening to two other conversations entirely.

====

In the kitchen Freya and Cat ha