flying lessons -- mal/river -- firefly
Title: Flying Lessons
Genre: Firefly/Serenity, post BDM.
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: Malcolm Reynolds, River Tam, Mal/River
Any warnings: Nope! Some reflection on character death, but nothing too bad.
Betas Used: All mistakes are my own :)
Summary: Mal is giving River flying lessons.
River stands in the doorway of the cockpit, a silhouette in the shadow behind the Captain. He knows she’s there before she knows he knows, and that scares her more than it should. He’s no psychic, but he’s got this sense for reading situations that flummoxes River to no end. His head flicks to one side, and she treads forward on bare feet silently.
“Ready for another lesson?” Mal asks, pressing down three switches on his right. Serenity hums beneath them with anticipation.
River raises an eyebrow. Mal rolls his eyes. “Alright, you could probably teach me more about this thing than I could ever keep in my noggin. But that ain’t flying, that’s all mathematics. You know math, frontwards and backwards and every-which-way-wards. What you don’t know is flying: real, true flying. ‘S an art,” Mal chides.
River concedes and slides into the copilot chair, waiting. She listens for his benefit; she knows what he’s going to say, even if he doesn’t know it himself yet.
“Put your hands on the stick console.” She does. The console is shaped like two ram horns and feels like an extension of herself beneath her thumbs. River knows this; she knows it all, knows how to fly a 03-K64 Firefly-class mid-bulk transport with a standard radion accelerator core. She knows, and yet she feels the obligation that she must relearn everything in order to be normal.
River looks out the glass pane in front of them and it is a pitch, ultimate black: darker than she’s ever seen it, with only a few stars to light the way. River glances at Mal, who seems pleased at her gawking.
“Intense,” Mal concurs, letting go of his own console. He stands and turns to her. River is small and collapsed in the aged leather seat, with her ankles tucked beneath her, all folded and small. Mal tries hard to remember that the girl is a killing machine and not some porcelain doll, ready to break at the ready. Course, that’s what she is at the heart: ready to break. It’s not an easy truth, nor one that Simon wants to hear. Mal knows that she’ll get better with time, and that somewhat eases his worries. River counts the beats in the deafening silence to tell when and where the storm is coming.
Mal slides his hands over the back of her seat. It is a good seat, one that he sat in for years while Wash still piloted Serenity. The seat had been good to him and he had seen the edges of the ‘verse in it. Maybe someday River would reclaim Wash’s seat from Mal and things could go back to the way they were before.
Mal watches Zoe in his peripheral vision push the hydrolic door of her bedroom quarters open and thinks perhaps the seat should lay vacant for just a while longer than he’d planned.
River is still staring out into the abyss. Her fingers are tight around the console now, a development Mal had been unaware of as he had daydreamed.
“Hey now,” he murmurs, peeling away the fingers on her right hand from the console, “you don’t want to strangle it.”
River lets go completely and watches as her hands fall into her lap. Her fingers clench and writhe, and River detaches from normalcy and descends, descends quickly into the crazy that Jayne always loved to tease but that Mal always feared and reviled.
“It’s too much, Simon, they can’t make me; no more needles--” River chokes out, pressing her long fingers to her face and pushing, pressing her cheeks in every which direction. Mal balks and does nothing for a moment, just listens to her nonsense. “Faceless girls they know me, Simon, their secrets I shouldn’t I don’t want them I can’t have them anymore! Simon...” River is standing in a flash, faster than Mal’s ever seen and he’s seriously considering pulling Simon out of whatever naughty predicament he was in with Kaylee at the moment to deal with this--
“Mal!”
It is his name that does it.
River is staring at him with wide eyes, and though her mouth continues meaningless nothings, her eyes speak to him. Stop me. Save me. Help me.
Mal’s arms are around the girl, crushing her, stopping her writhing. River twitches twice. Mal knows that she could kick his ass around the cockpit before spacing him and not a soul would know about it until about an hour later. So Mal waits for the storm to settle; he counts the beats in his head, and waits.
She rests her head against his chest; he is so tall to her, and so foreign. He is nothing like Simon, and River doesn’t know if that will help or hinder her in her quest for dominance over her subconscious. A few tears trickle out from beneath her locked eyelids. At last, it is done.
There is a heavy silence between them as she pulls away to face the stars once more, which have grown brighter over the whole debaucle, giving a small sheen to the cockpit.
“Good lesson,” he remarks. River turns to give him a scathing look, but her Captain is already gone.
Genre: Firefly/Serenity, post BDM.
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: Malcolm Reynolds, River Tam, Mal/River
Any warnings: Nope! Some reflection on character death, but nothing too bad.
Betas Used: All mistakes are my own :)
Summary: Mal is giving River flying lessons.
River stands in the doorway of the cockpit, a silhouette in the shadow behind the Captain. He knows she’s there before she knows he knows, and that scares her more than it should. He’s no psychic, but he’s got this sense for reading situations that flummoxes River to no end. His head flicks to one side, and she treads forward on bare feet silently.
“Ready for another lesson?” Mal asks, pressing down three switches on his right. Serenity hums beneath them with anticipation.
River raises an eyebrow. Mal rolls his eyes. “Alright, you could probably teach me more about this thing than I could ever keep in my noggin. But that ain’t flying, that’s all mathematics. You know math, frontwards and backwards and every-which-way-wards. What you don’t know is flying: real, true flying. ‘S an art,” Mal chides.
River concedes and slides into the copilot chair, waiting. She listens for his benefit; she knows what he’s going to say, even if he doesn’t know it himself yet.
“Put your hands on the stick console.” She does. The console is shaped like two ram horns and feels like an extension of herself beneath her thumbs. River knows this; she knows it all, knows how to fly a 03-K64 Firefly-class mid-bulk transport with a standard radion accelerator core. She knows, and yet she feels the obligation that she must relearn everything in order to be normal.
River looks out the glass pane in front of them and it is a pitch, ultimate black: darker than she’s ever seen it, with only a few stars to light the way. River glances at Mal, who seems pleased at her gawking.
“Intense,” Mal concurs, letting go of his own console. He stands and turns to her. River is small and collapsed in the aged leather seat, with her ankles tucked beneath her, all folded and small. Mal tries hard to remember that the girl is a killing machine and not some porcelain doll, ready to break at the ready. Course, that’s what she is at the heart: ready to break. It’s not an easy truth, nor one that Simon wants to hear. Mal knows that she’ll get better with time, and that somewhat eases his worries. River counts the beats in the deafening silence to tell when and where the storm is coming.
Mal slides his hands over the back of her seat. It is a good seat, one that he sat in for years while Wash still piloted Serenity. The seat had been good to him and he had seen the edges of the ‘verse in it. Maybe someday River would reclaim Wash’s seat from Mal and things could go back to the way they were before.
Mal watches Zoe in his peripheral vision push the hydrolic door of her bedroom quarters open and thinks perhaps the seat should lay vacant for just a while longer than he’d planned.
River is still staring out into the abyss. Her fingers are tight around the console now, a development Mal had been unaware of as he had daydreamed.
“Hey now,” he murmurs, peeling away the fingers on her right hand from the console, “you don’t want to strangle it.”
River lets go completely and watches as her hands fall into her lap. Her fingers clench and writhe, and River detaches from normalcy and descends, descends quickly into the crazy that Jayne always loved to tease but that Mal always feared and reviled.
“It’s too much, Simon, they can’t make me; no more needles--” River chokes out, pressing her long fingers to her face and pushing, pressing her cheeks in every which direction. Mal balks and does nothing for a moment, just listens to her nonsense. “Faceless girls they know me, Simon, their secrets I shouldn’t I don’t want them I can’t have them anymore! Simon...” River is standing in a flash, faster than Mal’s ever seen and he’s seriously considering pulling Simon out of whatever naughty predicament he was in with Kaylee at the moment to deal with this--
“Mal!”
It is his name that does it.
River is staring at him with wide eyes, and though her mouth continues meaningless nothings, her eyes speak to him. Stop me. Save me. Help me.
Mal’s arms are around the girl, crushing her, stopping her writhing. River twitches twice. Mal knows that she could kick his ass around the cockpit before spacing him and not a soul would know about it until about an hour later. So Mal waits for the storm to settle; he counts the beats in his head, and waits.
She rests her head against his chest; he is so tall to her, and so foreign. He is nothing like Simon, and River doesn’t know if that will help or hinder her in her quest for dominance over her subconscious. A few tears trickle out from beneath her locked eyelids. At last, it is done.
There is a heavy silence between them as she pulls away to face the stars once more, which have grown brighter over the whole debaucle, giving a small sheen to the cockpit.
“Good lesson,” he remarks. River turns to give him a scathing look, but her Captain is already gone.