Normally she dreaded the evenings. Lately, she’s been embracing them.

River was grateful now to ge-ge for getting her the guitar, and for Wash for giving her the music in which her salvation lay in. But she didn’t want to just come out and surprise them all and freak them out. She wanted this to be special. She wanted what she was saying to mean something to every person on board. Like a superhero with a mild-mannered alter ego, River pretended to be her normal self, throwing off their scents. It was amusing to see Simon freak out and find deep metaphorical meaning in Tenacious D lyrics. But once the crew went to bed, she quietly came alive in the cargo bay.

After listening to Wash’s entire library of music once over during the evenings, she began to play the chords and notes of the lead guitar, base and any other accompaniments over her headphones. She had memorized the rhythms and harmonies of the different instruments, and then taught herself how to play each of them, making sure each note had the right pitch, intonation and place. Even though the notes came easy, it gave her a sense of joy in resurrecting these old forgotten hooks, base lines and melodies. The sense of one set of fingertips picking away at the strings while the other set slid up and down the neck was making her grin from ear to ear. Every thought, feeling, sound and idea that was bottled up in her being was finally being let out. Every strum purged a doubt. Every chord empowered her with confidence. Every word she heard and mouthed gave her more clarity than any injection. After nights and nights and hours and hours of memorizing, recording and mouthing, she knew she was ready.

It was 6:58 on the ships internal clock. She knew that 7 was the time the Captain designated as wake up time for the crew. He would normally go to each of the bunks, saving Inara’s shuttle for last, and knock on each door. But the long cord that stretched from the cockpit console to her hand indicated that she would beat him to the punch. As