OOC: Meme.

Pretty standard: What I'm doing right, wrong or in between. Could be about anything, from icons to accents. Bring it on, but . . . y'know . . . gently.

Mal, in his bunk and in his head.

[ooc: written with original intention of putting in writing challenge, but it fits with Mal's goings-on too. yay!]
As much as he loves this ship and everything about her, sometimes Serenity was a little too gorram restricting. Also, the problem of wanting to avoid most people on the ship at the moment does manage to cut into freerange territory on his boat.

Not having any paper for doodling even if he was calm enough to come up with anything to create, Mal shuffles aimlessly around his bunk for a few moments, eyes landing finally on a PVP - Portable Video Presenter (patent pending) - taken by Wash on Kaylee's last birthday on the ship. Everyone was beaming, half happy that we had found real chocolate for a cake and half happy because the cost of the chocolate didn't eat up all the profits from the previous job. But things were simple, fun even.

Gorramit. I should've shot him. Mal knocks the thought out of his head as soon as it materializes, but that doesn't make him believe it any less for a minute. Only a minute, though. Mal understands the many many bad things that would most certainly happen if he did - him bein' locked up, Serenity's only medic leavin' 'fore a huge battle...or not leaving and waiting 'til he almost certainly winds up in Doc's care and has a choice of savin' Mal or not.

Doc wants his daddy safe, fine. That there was an idea Mal cannot wrap his Captain-Dummy brain around. Isn't this the guy that had a hand in this trouble for everyone from the get-go? Mal's mind flickers to his family back home, before learning how to shoot and lie and various other talents. He was happy then, but not as happy as being on Serenity. With Kaylee, the heart of everything, Inara? the beauty, and Book, the conscience. Wash, the free spirit, and Zoe the practicality, Jayne the strength and...

Simon and River? Simon's the booksmarts, but as he told Simon his first week on the ship, he ain't weak either. As for River? She could end up to be so many things that Mal can't point a finger at just one. Mal just...needs? wants to see her safe. Understanding her can come later.

Where does that leave me? Suppose that leaves Mal with the position that he has come to believe was what he wanted all along. Mal is the protector. Because this is his family now, not some memory back on Shadow. And this is where he wants to be.