What happened? Why had Inara left? Had she done something to make Inara leave? Was it her fault? But-but everything had been going so well. Serenity was operating better than she had in a long time; even River was doing better. Simon, sweet Simon, was finally beginning to relax; even the Captain had been in a much better mood. Now everyone is sulky and bad moody including herself. If only people were as easy to understand as machines. Inara and Captain had been so right together . . . when they weren’t fighting with each other. Sigh. She loves them both so much but they can be so pig-headed and blind. If only one of them had gotten down from their high horse and admitted how they felt. It would have been soo romantic. Speaking of romantic . . . Simon had been so close to relaxing and admitting how he felt. If Inara hadn’t left maybe she would have been a bridesmaid and Shepard Book could have conducted the ceremony on board Serenity and she and Simon could have lived happily ever after. They could’ve raised the kids to be mechanics and doctors and River would’ve gotten better and been ‘Auntie River’ and they could’ve called Captain ‘Gramps’ and--and . . . Sigh. The red wire connects to the red outlet and the yellow wire to the yellow inlet. Inara is like the older sister she never had, always willing to take time out of a busy schedule to listen to gripes about Simon and offer fashion advice. Now the only other two girls onboard were River and Zoe. She can’t exactly go griping those kind of gripes to Simon’s own sister and Zoe . . . well Zoe’s usually too busy worrying about important stuff to bother with such girly things. Well, maybe Inara would come back. Yeah. Inara loves Serenity almost as much as she does. And Inara loves her and everyone else on board, even Captain. Especially Captain. Ech, what a mess. Engine grease everywhere and probably all over her too. Hmm, maybe she should go give Simon a big hug.

Her eyes twinkle mischievously as she stands carefully making sure not to wipe her hands on her over