Chapter Text
It wouldn’t have happened, if they’d made her stay on the boat. Her good days were nearly normal days, now, when insanity was only a whisper in her stance or her glance and most of her words made sense. Her bad days . . . were still bad, although in subtly different ways than before they revealed Miranda’s dirty little secret. So when the good came, Simon determined to make the most of them, and the crew – except for Jayne – did not object. She went on-planet with them, as she always had, and no one thought twice about it. No one figured it might be unsafe to let her eat in the ice cream parlor with only Kaylee for company, while everyone else finished picking up various supplies. No one thought Jayne might be in any danger, alone with her at the train station guarding the last of those supplies while the rest of the crew was busy elsewhere.
No one felt the need to accompany her into the ladies’ room, certainly not Jayne.
That was how she came to be standing, trembling, tears tracking her cheeks, good days gone and bad days back with a vengeance, staring at a fragile lifeless form. Life gone, life lost, because she’d removed it. Crushed it away. Her Academy training hadn’t been triggered, but she knew that training was what screamed into her mind that the murder didn’t matter, was inconsequential. But no, that wasn’t right, was it, she had re-learned the truth,
“No life is inconsequential”, she muttered, staring at the blood, then with ascending volume, “No life, no life, NO LIFE -“ screaming, and she was crouching, covering the back of her head with her hands. On Serenity this would not have happened, it was pure there. It was home and only the approved were allowed on board. This one wouldn’t have been approved, would never have been allowed in – she, River, would not have been brought to this.
This was not the same as reavers or a bar full of thugs and criminals. She’d felt no remorse for those lives. But this one had been a true innocent, a mere annoyance, and surely had lacked even knowledge that she’d been annoying-
“I’m sorry, sorry,” River crooned to the corpse, as the door to the restroom flew open and Jayne burst through it, pistol out, searching the dingy cement room for a target. Finding none, he slowly lowered Wilma to frown at the crazy girl, who was crouched rocking crazy-like in a corner but appeared otherwise whole.
“What’s yer problem?” he growled, stepping away from the open doorway and stalking in her direction. “You look fine. Can’t be hollerin’ like that in these public places, for no reason.”
“The reason is obvious! She has killed again! She cannot control it! It was wrong, it was wrong, but she could not tell it at the time, not in time-” She gestured wildly at the bloody body, at the innocence slaughtered by her own hand.
Jayne stared where she indicated. Wrinkled his nose. Crouched down beside her, his boots treading on her outflung skirt, and put a hand to his mouth.
“Gorram, girl. That’s a mosquito.”