Fic: Broken in Whole
Title: Broken in Whole
Author: Rinny
Characters: Wash/River/Mal
Word Count: 626
Notes: Post-BDM. Crack!fic? Why, yes… yes it is. And who do we blame?
Aliaspiral, of course, who dared me to write this. I’m kinda in love with it, so be gentle.
Her hands never falter on the controls.
She knows the catch of every button. The grooves on the gear shifts that fit her fingers. The slight 0.26 degree pull of the right thruster.
Her hands know but they aren’t hers.
She doesn’t mind.
He filled those places in her once torn and bloody and she felt whole and more all at once. Lonely no more. She adopted him and he twisted through her, rising to fill her cracks and be again.
He tickled.
Simon didn’t believe her. Doesn’t still. It wasn’t science. Couldn’t be. River smiled and Wash laughed and he taught her faith.
She was they and he was her.
She loved him first.
Dancing, spinning, dripping sweat. She spiraled and he caught her. She’d never fall again.
They only needed one bed for her hands his hands on his skin in her body yes please oh god yes Wash.
He loved her best.
She gave him life. Shared her everything. Tore him down and built him up and loved him broken.
They played dinos and laughed. The others saw and they wept and worried and walked away.
But they that was she and he smiled and flew and breathed in. He fixed her and she lived him and the others chased the ghosts from their eyes but still they didn’t see.
When she broke--shiny like a knife cutting too deep so deep they aren’t moving wont hurt us can’t hurt us saved us all why does it hurt screaming screaming not a weapon-- it was he in they that held her.
And when Mal brandished her again--slash cut stab too often dull the blade that cut too deep she hated her and loved them--it was he that lived and breathed for them.
He that found the pieces scattered in the carnage and used glue made of tears to make a River again.
When he was they and she was his she glowed and Mal watched.
Captain Daddy with holes and cracks and no one to fill them.
When they caught him, Wash stirred and River flushed and they ebbed like the tide into him.
He wielded her again and again--his own living weapon tearing blood and bone and viscera ripping the girl and leaving the man to clean the pieces and make them whole. After, he spread sorries with his fingertips and gazed prayers with his eyes. Forgive me please don’t break don’t break I need you. River. Don’t break.
The glue wasn’t dry and her arms were heavy but Wash found balm for them both. He brushed regret charred black and heavy from his shoulders and blew the sins from his lashes and River loved him more.
The Captain came to them with eyes open and heart braced. Jade imbedded reckless and dirty in his skin and River picked it free and Wash made it into hope. Smooth and clean and beautiful they gave it to Mal with her hands and his words.
He heard with his heart and not his ears and she took his kisses and shared them with Wash.
Her hands danced and she smiled and molded Mal to them ‘till he fit and didn’t know it.
Wash broke on him, hope washing devastated on his shores.
Her hands never falter on the controls.
Unrest is flying untamed through the ship and lands with ruffled feathers in the cockpit. It‘s her turn now.
Tilt of chin lilt of voice curve of mouth turn of phrase running scrambling for ground gone missing behind their chair.
She smiles at him in her as his fingers skim across their heart.
The ocean in them rolls and spins and they look up at the Captain.
And Mal looks into brown eyes and sees blue.