Disclaimer: Joss owns it, I play with it, end of story.

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Kaylee sat in her hammock in Serenity's engine room, staring at all of the moving parts that kept the ship going. Everything was in working order, maybe not perfect working order, but it still worked. Unfortunately, this meant that Kaylee had nothing to do to keep herself occupied. She had gone into the cargo bay, but there Jayne was working out and talking to Shepherd Book, and Kaylee didn't want to interrupt their manly bonding time. She had gone up to the bridge, but there Wash was having a discussion with Zoe and Kaylee didn't want to intrude on their husband and wife time. She hadn't seen the captain in a while so she assumed that he was busy somewhere. Inara had stayed behind on Beaumonde with a client and they weren't picking the woman up for another few days yet. Kaylee had stopped by the infirmary as well, but Simon was preoccupied with River, as usual.

Seeing that there was nothing for her to do, no one for her to talk to, Kaylee had come back to the engine room to think. She lay back comfortably in her hammock and stared up at the ceiling, hearing the comforting hum of Serenity's engine in the background. As she listened to the familiar sounds of the engine, Kaylee thought back over the past little while. Her thoughts mixed around for a while until they finally settled on a happy memory. She remembered the night she and the captain had gone to the ball with Inara and Atherton.

Kaylee thought back to just before she had left for the ball with the captain. She had been in her bunk, putting on the dress he had bought for her as a peace offering, and was having a bit of a hard time. Thoroughly annoyed with the zipper that she couldn't reach at the back, Kaylee had to find someone to help her zip up the dress. She bunched it all up so that it didn't get caught on the ladder or the screws in the walls around the ladder as she climbed up and out of her quarters. Looking down t