Job: Beylix

[badinlatin]

This could have gone better.

The bullet graze on his bicep is bleeding pretty impressively, but Mal still has all sensation in his forearm, so he's not worried. He even smiles a bit, firing off one round - two - three, all in the direction of the lawmen pursuing him. One bullet blows the lead tire of a motorbike behind him which launches the rider up and over like so much dead weight. Should wear a helmet, jackass.

It's more luck than Mal admits that he makes it up the cargo bay ramp before the lawmen manage another decent shot. The take is still on the mule - wrapped up and sealed, all the protein of the rainbow - and Mal doesn't even inspect it. He barks to River to take off, and he heads to Milliways before anyone manages to talk to him.








He's got a new shirt and a couple glasses of bourbon in him before he comes home.

Comments

[river_meimei]

When Mal returns, the boxes have been unloaded from the mule and stacked tidily in one corner of the cargo bay, and Wash is piloting. (There's some tricky airspace up ahead, and Wash gets to take any tricky piloting unless it's a really big emergency.)

River is sitting cross-legged on top of the protein boxes, watching the doorway that just closed behind Mal.

[badinlatin]

Mal gets a noncommittal sort of grunt, as much of a 'hello' as anything verbal that could've been offered.

But she's got one of those looks on her.

Fine.

"Wèi."

[river_meimei]

River's gaze switches from the doorway to Mal. (More or less. It's River.)

After a moment, her mouth twitches: rueful and fond.

"You're a dummy," she tells him, and slides off the heap of sealed crates.

[badinlatin]

"At least I'm consistent."

Belly still warm from the drinks, "Or have I hit new levels?"

[river_meimei]

River rolls her eyes (affectionately) at the first.

"Not yet."

Don't take that as a challenge, Mal.

"It's not a practical hobby."

She's pacing towards him on bare feet, in easy silent steps, her path only a little meandering. As often with River, it seems a deliberate meander, though no obstacles are visible to anyone else's eyes.

[badinlatin]

Scratching behind his ear (an old tell, and a reliable one), "I wear riding boots on a spaceship. What about me yells 'practicality' from the mountainside?


"We got the take. Not a hobby - it's a payday."

[river_meimei]

"It's a false dichotomy."

She lifts a hand, drifting her fingers through the air just above Mal's wounded arm, never quite touching. Her gaze follows her hand, but it's hard to say what she sees.

Softer, "'Nara worries." Her gaze flicks back up to Mal's face, and this time it's focused.

[badinlatin]

That is never not creepifyin'.

"Wo dong. I ain't unaware."

[river_meimei]

"Because you're being a dummy," River clarifies.

You're welcome, Mal.

She sidesteps as she says it, though, to bring herself around beside him instead of facing him down.

[badinlatin]

"On account of a little graze? Just cause your brother ain't here don't mean I can't take care of my own self."

Clearly that's what she's talking about.

He hopes.

When River shifts, Mal backs up slightly. She may not be trying to face him down, but she feels awfully close all of a sudden.

[river_meimei]

River rolls her eyes. Dramatically.

He takes so much looking after.

"Prove it, cap'n."

[badinlatin]

"[Don't start.]"

That's apparently all the conversation Mal feels like, if River's going to be...whatever is going on here.

"We done?"

[river_meimei]

"No."

[badinlatin]

Great.

"Then say your piece so I can go on with my gorram day."

[river_meimei]

River's starting to look frustrated. So that makes two of them!

"It's reciprocity."

"You're crew too. What it means. In the ontology."

"Don't be a dummy when it's needless."

[badinlatin]

Mal gets what River is trying to say. He knows that River doesn't like it when Mal is in a precarious position. Rather he stick to the quieter jobs, most likely. Maybe she thinks he's lost a step.

Don't be a dummy when it's needless.

"I'm goin' to take the jobs what turn profit, River. Same as always."

Even when it's not.

[river_meimei]

"You're ignoring the back. Pretends it's not relevant."

[badinlatin]

Mal's eyes close and he exhales.

"There are days when I miss not understandin' what you were gettin' at. I'm going to go now."

[river_meimei]

River doesn't miss those days. The sour face she makes probably says so.

She doesn't try to stop him, anyway. Just watches, thoughtful and a little irked.

She's said her piece. He understood it. That's where it stands, that's all.