When Simon awoke, having been viciously knocked unconscious by his sister, he was laying in a desert. For the neat and orderly Dr. Tam, a desert was the worst possible place to be. There was dirt, sand, everywhere...blowing into his very mouth with every breath. From one side of him, a blue, cool light shone. From the other, a rough, hot red light overwarmed that side of his face. He had had this dream several times since boarding Serenity. Since meeting Kaylee.

When he turned to face the blue light, there was Kaylee, wearing something gauzy and flimsy. Wonderfully alive and vibrant...near humming with vitality. There was water everywhere around her, and the wind wasn't kicking up. There was a lovely breeze licking at him from her direction. She smelt of strawberries.

From the other direction, the red light proved once again to be his sister, and here is where Simon's dream had been altered mercilessly. Simon knew in the dream that he had to choose between the two of them. He didn't know why, he just did. And, he always chose River. The sister he had looked after well into her young adulthood. Here was a nightmare version of her though. Her hair was wet with her own sweat. Her eyes were the black/red he had seen earlier. Her fingernails were growing into points. She hissed at him, and her teeth were as frightening as they had been.

But, behind this nightmare form of River stood the little girl that Simon remembered being such a brat. The little girl that always made him feel like an idiot every time she spoke. And this little girl looked horrified. She reached for Simon, but suddenly disappeared behind the other form of herself.

And, like that, Simon understood what was going on. It had been laying right out in fron of him the whole time. River took a step towards him, and for the first time, he ran from her. Even in her state, she was still his sister, but her visage frightened him so completely that he ran. Not for himself. He ran to protect Kaylee from Ri