Fic: Buttercup
Title: Buttercup
Author: Rinny
Characters: Jayne, River, Kaylee and the rest.
Rating: G, humor
Word Count: 1841
Summery: Jayne done bad, and now he's being punished.
Notes: Written for aliaspiral at 2:00 in the morning, blame all craziness on her. Thanks to thegranddewru for beta.
Leaving the bridge after setting the ship to auto-pilot, Wash stopped on his way to the galley, just short of running into Mal, Zoe, Inara and Book, who stood gathered silently in the doorway.
"There an invisible shield on the door I'm unaware of?"
"Shhhh!"
He frowned, resting a hand on Zoe's back, lowering his voice, "What are we watching?"
She shifted to the side, allowing him a glimpse into the dining area to see Jayne seated at the table, his chin resting on one hand as he stared across the room. "Um. What's he doing?"
"We're not certain," Mal responded, a hint of a smile in his words. "But he might be thinking."
"Ahh," Wash nodded, tilting his head to study Jayne for a beat. "Why is he wearing a pink collar?"
-
Sometimes, Jayne wondered how he got himself in these situations. Was it his own fault for steppin' foot on this boat to begin with? For not sellin' River and Simon down the... well, the river, before he started carin' about 'em? When he went and forgot that all women folk were naturally evil and not to be trusted?
Yeah. That was probably it.
He didn't mean to rat 'em out. Not really. It's just, Mal’s much scarier than the two of them. River might be able to kill him with her brain, but he was damned sure Mal already had a dozen ways to end him all nice and planned out. He was always wary of River, just turned out he hadn’t been wary enough. And he just downright underestimated Little Kaylee. Girl's got a more devious mind than anyone that cute lookin' ought to.
Genius mechanic and genius crazy-girl were dangerous enough on their own, but now that they combined forces... Jayne shuddered. He needed to put a stop to it before it got any worse.
First mornin' after leavin' Paquin was bad enough. Woke up with that cold metal collar circlin' his neck and no recollection how it'd gotten there. Spent an hour tuggin' on it, trying to find the catch to get it off, but the Mostly-sane one had gone and welded it somehow. Some small part 'o him was prideful of them bein' so stealthy-like.
But mostly, he was mad.
Wasn't till the second day, when Mostly-crazy had snuck into his bunk again and attached a leash while he was sleeping, that he even realized the gorram thing was pink.
Pink!
They were set to land on Jianjing in three days and he needed the ruttin' thing off before then. Was one thing for the rest of the crew not to take him seriously, they never had before. But no self respectin' mercenary went about with a collar.
A pink collar.
'Course, the bad guys might laugh themselves to death and save him a bullet.
-
By day three, he still had no plan and the name "Buttercup" stenciled on the collar, surrounded by little yellow flowers.
Mal was startin' to look less and less scary and Jayne was gettin' desperate. He cornered the Captain on the bridge soon as he could find him. "Mal, you gotta put a stop to this."
"Stop to what?" He blinked innocently, his eyes studiously focused on Jayne's instead of the bright atrocity a few inches lower.
"It aint dignified!"
"I'd say that's probably so," he nodded thoughtfully. "But I'm afraid there just aint much I can do about it. I prefer to let my crew members work out their differences alone, less there's the danger of bloodshed. In which case I might step in." Jayne opened his mouth but Mal raised a finger to cut him off, "But, you go threaten either one of them girls, we'll be keel haulin' you by that pretty leash. Dong ma?"
“But Mal…”
“Talk to the girls, they’re reasonable folk,” his grin betrayed his utter amusement, “Most of the time.”
Jayne figured it was best to try them one at a time. He started with Kaylee, since she usually had at least a lick of sense in that pretty head of hers. Problem was the girl was as kuang zhe de as River.
“Can’t go on world like this, Kaylee,” he tugged on the leash. “No one’ll take me seriously. People could get hurt. People mainly me.”
She shrugged a shoulder while she tinkered with the engine, “You brought it on yourself, Jayne. I just did what needed doin’.”
“C’mon. Take it off. Y‘all had your fun.”
She flashed him a big ole grin, the one that usually made his head spin. This time, it made his heart plummet somewhere ‘round his knees. “Can’t.”
“Whaddya mean ‘can’t’?”
“Mean, I can’t.” She went back to workin’, “Takes two t’get it off, so’s even if I was feelin’ generous ‘nough to forgive ya--and I aint--you still gotta convince River.”
He didn’t relish the idea of askin’ the feng le girl to forgive him, when he didn’t even do nothin’ wrong. But Jayne was man enough to admit them two had him cornered. Problem was, took him most of the day to even find Mostly-crazy, and by then he’d worked himself into another temper.
He finally found her sittin’ astride the mule in the cargo bay. Way up high near the ceilin’. “Get your crazy ass down here and take this thing offa me!”
Not his best opening ever.
“No.”
“Gorramit girl, yes!” He stamped his foot on the grating near hard enough to send an echo through the whole bay.
“Guilt multiplied by current disposition does not outweigh girls’ amnesty,” she recited as though it were some poem.
“Don’t got no idea what you just said, but take this gorram thing off!”
“Means no, Buttercup.”
-
He woke up the fourth morning with a bell.
A little tiny bell that made tinkling sounds whenever he moved.
By breakfast, Wash had a black eye, Simon had to give Mal three stitches and Zoe had locked the girls in Kaylee’s cabin for their own safety. That left Jayne to growl menacingly from the door of the infirmary where Simon was still workin’ on Mal.
The Captain was much too happy for a man that was bleedin‘. “Now, I aint sayin’ I didn’t deserve it,” he grinned, and Jayne was sorely tempted to hit him again. “But enough’s enough. Whatever you did, you make it right, so we can do the job tomorrow without me and Zoe dissolving into giggles and gettin’ ourselves shot.”
“Can’t ya just order them to take it off?”
“An’ ya think they wont get back at ya again? Ten times worse?”
He had a fair point. And Jayne had no desire to see what could be worse.
Weren’t no secret he was a selfish man. Just didn’t see the point in givin’ to others what he could use himself. Never imagined he’d be givin’ away something so valuable to two bu hui hen de po fu who got him tied in knots.
Was long past dinner before he got calm enough again to make proper apologies--even though it weren’t his fault. Both girls were lookin’ mighty pleased with themselves, sittin’ together on couch in the lounge. Probably plottin’ their next prank.
He grimaced at the thought.
“Buttercup can sit with us,” River smiled beatifically, patting the small space between herself and Kaylee.
“Don’t need to be sittin’ I just came to, uh,” he swallowed. “Apologize.”
River narrowed her eyes, still smiling, and pointed to the spot on the couch. “Sit.”
Wouldn’t do no good to start fightin’ before he even got ‘round to the apologizin’ part, so he sat, squeezed in between ’em both and tried again. “I got something to say and--”
Kaylee flicked the little bell on his collar.
“Would you stop that?” He growled, “I’m tryin’ to talk here.”
River pet his hair soothingly.
They was startin’ to scare him a little, so he reached in his pocket and pulled out a small bag and thrust it into River’s hands, as she was the most scary at the moment. “I ain’t tryin’ to buy ya off, but… ya girls ain’t had a treat in a while, so’s…”
Kaylee leaned over him to watch River open the bag. The younger girl grinned, pulling out a piece of chocolate, “Theobromine and phenylethylamine.”
“You brought us chocolate?” Kaylee grinned reaching into the bag for a piece. “Ya must really be sorry.”
“It’s all I got, so ya better make it last,” he cautioned. Real chocolate was a rarity in the verse. Only one planet was able to cultivate the cocoa beans, and Jayne had been hoarding his stash for a good long while.
Kaylee made a completely inappropriate sound in the back of her throat.
He tugged uncomfortably at the collar, but at least they were both too busy eatin’ to interrupt him. “I’m sorry for rattin’ ya out to the Captain.” He took a deep breath, lookin’ up at the ceilin’ cause he couldn’t rightly look at either one of them. “I only did it ‘cause I knew he wouldn’t let ya keep that puppy. Soon as we landed, he’d a booted the poor thing off on Jianjing, and I didn’t want neither of ya gettin’ attached, just so’s you could get your hearts broken.”
“That was right sweet of you, Jayne.” Kaylee curled up on the couch, leaning against him and plucking up another piece of chocolate, “In a backward sort of way.”
“Forgiven.” River rested her head on his shoulder, nibbling on a piece of chocolate. “Buttercups make better pets than canines.”
“That mean you’ll take this thing off?” He asked hopefully.
The girls exchanged a look that didn’t seem to bode well for him.
“Please?”
-
It was late and there was a job to do in the morning, so Wash thought it strange that Zoe wasn’t in their bunk when he finished setting course for the night. There weren’t many places she could be, and he found her in the passenger lounge with Mal, Simon and Book debating the wisdom of waking up the trio sleeping on the couch.
“He’ll be sore in the morning, sleepin’ like that. A sore mercenary is a cranky mercenary.”
“And when isn’t Jayne cranky?” Wash threw his two cents in as he joined them, keeping his voice low. “Hey, is that chocolate?”
Book smiled serenely, “I expect Jayne’s quite comfortable where he is.”
“The girls too for that matter,” Zoe smiled.
“That’s what I’m afraid of,” Simon grimaced, naturally disturbed that either girl would willingly get that close to the man ape.
“No, really,” Wash frowned, “Is that chocolate? Where did they get real chocolate?”
“We should wake them.”
“Really think it’s wise to go disturbin’ the peace now that we have it, sir?”
“River really should be in her own bed.”
“How long has there been chocolate aboard and I didn’t know about it?”
“Shhh!” The four were silenced by Kaylee, cracking her eye open to glare at them. River, snuggled a little closer to Jayne without opening her eyes, “Puppy’s sleeping.”