[ okay dokay, here's part five. Sorry if it starts sounding like a Mary Sue or something, but there's plenty of bumps about Ana that haven't been written yet.... ]

Zoë and Wash were beginning to get rather over playful before they heard the music.

Wash was on top of Zoë, who was on top of the kitchen table. He had just begun to unbutton her shirt when the silence that came with the absence of their dirty talk for a moment hadn’t been so silent.

“What is that?” Zoë looked around, trying to pinpoint a source for the muffled but nonetheless beautiful melody they were hearing. Wash stopped too, and they lay on top of one another, listening.

“Isn’t that coming from Inara’s old room?” As soon as their arousal was distracted it was forgotten, and Zoë buttoned up her shirt and followed her husband towards the newcomer’s room. They walked lightly, trying not to make much noise. As they neared the room it got louder.

It was a guitar. A perhaps old-fashioned Earth instrument, but the melody plucked from it was a beautiful one. Then, suddenly, it broke into chords- and a moment later a throaty, slightly raspy, and beautiful voice gave the melody that had been playing before shape.

“And when I rest, O love of mine

I’ll watch your dreams within mine

I’ll know everything you know and love you

But when you close your eyes and think

Of every ship that wouldn’t sink

You’ll know everything and I hope you love me

And if the gentle starlight won’t remind you

If they are no longer there to guide you

Look for my face in the blackest night

And when you find it, then you’ll have your love-light,”

The chords strummed, the voice was a fraction louder. Zoë looked down the hall and saw Simon creeping slowly towards them, his face frozen for straining his ears.

“Those were the merry fields

Where all the children would congeal

And I was always the last one to get there

But then you would understand

(I would imagine you taking my hand)

And we’d run with the others but not see them

So if you