Disclaimer: Don’t own Firefly or Serenity. Just playing in Joss’s sandbox.

A/N – Sorry for the delay folks! Also, the nickname River mentions I lifted from the fanfic ‘Fable’ by EreshkigalGirl

Heart of Stone

Chapter Eleven

Zoe was in a meditative mood.

Serenity was headed back to the moon once known as Deadwood by the few who had ever heard of it, and now known as Liberty by practically the whole ‘verse. It had been almost a year now since they’d first touched down there on that dusty patch of earth to help a group protect what was theirs from another’s claim. And now they were doing much the same thing, albeit on a larger scale.

The work went on, but they were also invited to Jonah’s first birthday party. Conflict and political upheaval were raging across the ‘verse, but the ordinary things, like a baby’s first birthday, were still being celebrated.

It was late in the ship’s night cycle now, and Zoe had volunteered for what was still known, centuries after ships had taken from seas to the skies, as the ‘dog watch,’ the sailors’ terminology still being used as the cosmic life was not all that different from the nautical one.

She switched the power on of the long range radio. She wondered how the early settlers had been able to manage – back in the old days before inter-stellar triangulated communications – those colonists only able to send waves intra-planetary, in system, forced to bounce messages around in a complicated network of stations and satellites where half the time the message had been lost between systems.

Zoe kept the volume on a low setting as she adjusted to the different frequencies, searching for someone to listen to, to give the allusion of company as the rest of the ship slept. A burst of static, and then a cajoling woman’s voice came over the waves:

*bzzt*

-know Madame Morwen has the answers! See what the stars have in store for you! Come for a reading, conveniently located on Yang Liwei Space Station’s C deck, next to the main parking area. Open-

*bzzt*

She flipped the dial again and another woman’s voice, singing a soft melody of childhood memories, floated over the waves:

bu yao ku rang ying huo chong dai zhe ni tao pao / xiang jian de ge yao yong yuan de yi kao / tong nian de zhi fei ji xian zai zhong yu fei hui wo shou li-

*bzzt*

She clicked through some more wavelengths:

*bzzt*-

limited time offer, order your copy now for just a monthly rate-

*bzzt*

Smilin’ Joe guarantees his cleaning system will filter out anything THEY pump into your atmo, now for the low, low price of-

*bzzt*

- a pair of three-run homers while Carl Becket and Jiang Jieshi each added a long ball of their own as the Isaacville Rockets captured a 11-3 victory over the New Paris Lions marking a stunning conclusion to the Londinium playoffs-

*bzzt*

-I’d like to teach the Verse to sing / in perfect harmony / and buy them all a Fēicháng Cola / it’s the real thing-

*bzzt*

Zoe snorted in amused exasperation as she idly spun the dial around. Things couldn’t be that bad if things like soda sales and baseball finals were continuing as smoothly as that.

Further adjustments to the radio brought the sounds of something classical, evoking the imagery of men wearing velvet jackets and powdered wigs, but it didn’t quite fit her mood, so she searched some more until the soft notes of smoky jazz wafted through the ether.

Zoe listened to the jazz and remembered night watches in the past on the bridge with Wash, listening to music like this.

Thinking of Wash was a minefield. Some days she was able to remember his laugh, his smile, his jokes, his love, and be happy, knowing she had experienced something so few people did. Other days, the mere sight of where he usually sat at the table would force her to hastily excuse herself from the meal, citing nausea, and retreat to her room, where she was inevitably followed by one or more of the crew.

Her room was now in the passenger area, since Simon had shown his rarely seen metal/doctor-spine and insisted that since she was now in her third trimester, she refrain from going up and down ladders.

She had agreed to the logic, violently pushing away the useless emotion of sorrow and anger that rose up in her at losing a link to her days with Wash, because she knew she had to do what was best for the baby. But the passenger dorms certainly made it easier for people to access her when she most wanted to be left alone.

When Mal came after her he would swing back and forth between awkward inquires to how she was doing and thoughtful reminiscences on times they had shared. While Inara had still been on board she had invariably came by with little speeches on love, life and death, and how they were all One, sounding like a silk draped bhikkhuni.

Simon would insist on barging in for health checks and engage in the kind of by-route bedside manner that was probably a class in med school, while Kaylee would come in and pretend to have to fix some wiring or lighting problem in the room and chatter on about her nephews and nieces in extended Frye family back home on Zephyr and how babies were so much fun and how everyone on board was going to be there to help Zoe.

Even Jayne stopped by a time or two, usually to give some gruffly mumbled baby care advice, picked up from having five younger sisters.

River would occasionally be the one to arrive when Zoe was trying to shut people away. The young girl would usually solemnly place her hand on Zoe’s increasing bump, and say something cryptic about ‘oh nest of spicary’ that Zoe took to mean the baby was doing well.

Simon certainly kept reassuring her that everything was proceeding on schedule, that she was doing great, and that the baby was healthy, and that he didn’t anticipate any problems with the birth. He repeated himself often, she noticed with wry amusement, seeming to be trying to assure himself rather than her. And she had noticed him stocking up with extra supplies in the infirmary and reading up on any and all gynecology texts he download off the Cortex.

She had mentioned at one point that he hadn’t gotten half so worked up over delivering Petaline’s child. He had smiled self depreciatingly and said that he hadn’t had as long to remember all the things that can wrong, as well as knowing that in this case the captain would space if anything went wrong with delivering Zoe’s baby.

‘Zoe’s baby’ was the official appellation the crew had given the unborn child, although Mal was still inclined to make references to ‘the Stowaway,’ thinking he was being funny. Zoe still hadn’t decided on a name, two names, to be precise, since she had told Simon to leave her the surprise of whether it was a boy or a girl. She’d already considered and rejected dozens of names so far, none of them sounding quite right. As if knowing her thoughts, the baby started kicking.

She rested on her hands on her much enlarged belly, delighting, as ever, in feeling the feeling of the baby’s movements. A few months back the touch had been feather light, leaving her wondering at first if she was just imagining she felt her child stirring, but soon it had been stronger, like she had swallowed a cloud of butterflies, and now the baby was making it abundantly clear that the space currently occupied was becoming much too small.

“Not long now,” she told the baby in a soft tone. “Patience, little one.” The baby kicked again. “Tired of jazz?” she asked, amused. “I suppose ‘Coltrane’ is off the name list then.”

She chuckled as the baby continued to shift. She switched the radio again and landed on a talk show:

-so called “Republic” these yokels have set up is not only an illegal breach of everything the Alliance has set up in the way of government, it’s a joke, utterly laughable that a handful of hicks could-

-If I might jump right in- interrupted a second voice, -but you have to remember these ‘hicks,’ as you call them, have already evicted Alliance representatives from twelve Rim and Border worlds, including Greenleaf and Rosetta, two hardly low class words, and have forced the Alliance reps there back to the Core, one of them quite literally gift wrapped-

Zoe smiled in pleased remembrance; the large red bow the Deadwood magistrate had been tied up in before being unceremoniously dumped on the steps of Parliament House in New Paris had been River’s idea.

-An uncalled kuh wu act of hostility!- The first voice shouted angrily.

-Chairwoman Burgess- started the second voice.

-Chairwoman? Please, spare me the ridiculous airs these criminals are giving themselves. This zuò xiǎojiě da jeh da they got- sneered the first voice.

-Madame Chairwoman Burgess- repeated the second voice in a less moderate tone, -stated clearly that it was a rational response to previous acts of violence by the hwo gai Alliance-

-that’s the pot calling the kettle black, you- started the first voice, and the two voices started shouting insults at one another, until they were both indistinguishable as they yelled on top of one another.

Zoe adjusted the frequency to try and find a slightly less… passionate news report. She found a dry report being read in the crisp tones of someone from either Victoria or one of the moons of that planet, Diana and Elizabeth:

-and the Alliance fleet was again forced to turn back after yet another sabotaged air filtration system rendered the crews of all seventy-seven ships ill for six days. As promised by Chairwoman Burgess, there were no fatalities, although she has recently issued a statement that she will no longer restrain from using non-permanent methods on uninvited Alliance ships in areas that have been declared part of the new Republic-

Zoe smiled. It actually felt good being part of the news again. She remembered days back during the Unification War, now more often being referred to as ‘The Old War,’ when she and Mal would occasionally get a hold of a battered but working radio or a yellowed newspaper and read or listen to reports of battles they had been in the forefront of.

The ‘filtration attack’ being used now had been Mrs. Burgess’s idea. She somehow had contacts on Greenleaf able to supply her with the standard chemicals used in Alliance ships, altered slightly to make anyone breathing the air sick enough to have to get off the ship before it had reached its destination.

‘Turnabout is fair play’ the chairwoman had coldly told members of her hastily formed proto-government. She had stressed, first to those she had told her plans to, and then to everyone in mass broadcasts, that the sabotage would be non-lethal (to start) to make the initial point clear: the Republic was off limits to Alliance so called “peacekeeping” forces.

The Alliance had yet to concede the point, but Mrs. Burgess’s successful implementation of her strategy had bought the newly formed Republic quite a lot of breathing space as they got things set up.

Zoe smiled. No one was quite sure how ‘Madame Chairwoman’ had pulled it off. She seemed to have a deft hand at arranging for several seperate pieces to come together at the last moment, making sure that no one but herself knew what the big picture was to protect plans from any danger of interference.

Meanwhile, River had helped Simon make several leaps in treating her. A new combination of prescriptions that she had recommended gave her a full afternoon of clarity; Simon actually shed a few tears as he spoke with the girl she had once been and the rest of the crew were shocked to see the difference in her a she calmly gave instructions on what he needed to do next, and also took the time to warmly thank everyone else for all the help they had given her since she had come on board.

However, when Simon had something about her being ‘back,’ she had snapped at him that she was not, nor wished to be, the naïve and stuck up little girl she had once been.

When he had tried to protest, she had cut him off quickly, telling him her brain had made her believe that she was smarter than everyone else, leading her to walk stupidly straight into the cage the Alliance had set up – and had earned her the nickname ‘Prima Bitcherina’ back in dance class. She was ready, she told him, to grow up. And Simon ceased his objections.

River then turned the infirmary into a laboratory, somehow making some new drug combinations by hand as well as assembling some complex looking equipment that Simon explained, only slightly baffled at her ability to put it together with only spare parts from around the ship, would help worth adjusting the electro-magnet timbre of her brain waves to further get her back to normality.

The last time they had been on the newly christened Liberty, River had helped Mrs. Burgess set up more long wave broadcasts. The woman put her own severity to good use, showing herself on camera to be a leader willing to step up and take charge, again and again citing as she spoke to people across the Rim and Border that they were receiving no help from the Core, so they had to help themselves.

She had started off wearing gowns of solid white, symbolically showing her grief for all those had died on Miranda, but in her more recent speeches was wearing brighter colors, vivid and energetic, as she asked for support.

Former Independent factions, both civilian supporters and veteran soldiers, were crawling from the woodwork, their passion for the cause re-kindled by the proof that the Alliance did not know what was best for them, the slogans of ‘The Right to Breath,’ and ‘Remember Miranda’ chanted and plastered everywhere.

However, Madame Chairwoman was always quick to reiterate in broadcasts that this wasn’t a reformation of the Independents – this was a cause that embraced the whole of the Rim and Border territories, stressing that everyone, no matter what the side they had taken in the previous conflict, had to unite to guarantee their safety from those who had killed their own in their well intentioned meddling.

Mrs. Burgess had personally asked Inara to journey to the more pro-Alliance areas to court people from the former Companion’s old social circles. The ‘Tea and Talk’ campaign, she had named it, shrewdly guessing that there were a lot of people who could be won over with sweet talk a lot quicker than with displays of force.

Mal and Inara had talked a long time about it, and when she left on her mission, their good bye had been so sweet it left Jayne gagging and Kaylee cooing, already making wedding plans for her favorite captain and jie-jie.

Zoe shook her head sadly; Kaylee didn’t seem to realize that things were on the edge of a major shake up – Inara was the first, but would not be the last to leave the group. Zoe suspected they would all soon be going in different directions – they were needed in different places.

She knew Caroline had already started talking with Simon about the logistics of setting up a main army hospital for the Republic with perhaps a fleet of medic ships serving as ambulances and field hospitals. And Kaylee’s skills would probably be needed in one of the junkyards where people were scrambling to make old junkers space worthy again for the cause.

The Alliance were finding their representatives continually pushed from the Border and Rim and their forces unable to get in; it hadn’t come to battles yet, but-

The comm link began to beep insistently. They were being hailed by… Zoe peered closer at the signature…Monty? The proximity light started flashing as well, chirping in an annoying staccato, both demanding her attention.

She flicked the alert off and opened up the comm link and returned the hail. “Monty, you sasquatch, what brings you to this neck of the woods?”

“Zoe?” The voice of the old war buddy came over the waves. “Thank the frick-fracking gods.”

Zoe rubbed the bridge of her nose tiredly even as she felt the adrenaline start to pump. She knew that tone of voice – it meant Monty had bad news of the variety of he had done something that caused troubled that was going to effect everyone else.

“ ’Heard a rumor you and Mal were putting together a fleet for this new republic,” said Monty hopefully.

Yep. Trouble. “We’re still running cargo.” Zoe smiled and let a hint of maliciousness creep into her tone, “mostly dumping Alliance trash.”

“Yeah, the bow was a nice touch,” he said hurriedly. “Listen, you fitted the old fei wu with any weapon upgrades?”

“Just a few laser cannons.”

“To ma duh,” he swore mildly. “Well, it’ll have to do.”

“Monty?” she asked calmly and steadily, “what did you do?”

“Well, I’m hauling supplies and a bunch of volunteers - God they are such kids - to the recruiting station the Chairwoman got set up on Artemisia. Uh, but,” he hesitated.

“Spit it out, soldier,” barked Corporal Zoë Alleyne.

“Ran into an Alliance patrol and we showed ‘em what we think of the interfering ung jeong jia ching jien soh with a few shots, and now we got a whole gorram squad on our tail.”

“Great,” groaned Zoë. “How long ‘till we see fire?”

“About two minutes.”

Zoe slammed her fist on the all ship alert and barked into the intra-ship com unit: “Attention everyone!! Enemy ships approaching! We will see fire in less than two minutes! Kaylee, get to the engine room, now! I need our pilot’s pigu up here now! Everyone ready for battle stations and report in! Repeat, full alert, enemy ships approaching. We will be seeing fire!”

She put the ship klaxon alarm on for good measure.

River came running in at full speed, looking deceptively cute and disheveled in a pair of white flannel pajamas and her hair still sleep tossed.

“Situation?” River asked succinctly as she strapped herself into the adjacent seat.

“Monty decided to pick a fight before the war even officially began,” snapped Zoe.

River made a noise of angry frustration.

“Didn’t see this coming?” asked Zoe, more or less calmly, her eyes never leaving the screen.

River began pounding instructions into the console. “Stupidity cannot be mathematically factored,” she growled.

Mal came stumbling onto the bridge, still hastily pulling on his clothes.

Zoe started to explain but Monty interrupted from the screen: “Mal, you there? Just like old times, eh?” he chuckled.

“Yeah, just like,” grumbled Mal. “Give me a sit-rep, soldier,” he said, still buttoning his shirt.

The intra-ship com buzzed: “Zoe, I’m in the engine room, and I’ve got Simon with me, what’s going on?” asked Kaylee, her voice shaky, just a shade away from panic.

“Kaylee, listen to me,” instructed Zoe calmly, ignoring Mal as he talked with Monty, “get the engine going to full capacity and get ready to deal with anything that’s about to go wrong. We’re about to ask a lot from our girl, so do what you can to get ready. Tell Simon to help with what he can, but he’s got be ready to drop everything for a possible triage soon. Got that?”

“Got it,” said Kaylee, a bit more confidently.

The proximity alarm started going off again and the com began spouting multiple transmissions, most from the five Alliance patrol boats, demanding both Serenity and Monty’s Annabel halt and prepare for bordering, along with the usual threats of non-compliance would result in the use of force.

Jayne came bustling in, strapped with so many weapons he looked like a walking arsenal. River glanced at him. “If it comes to hand to hand combat, then we’ve already lost,” she said calmly.

“We’ll see, genius,” was the best Jayne could shoot back.

Mal was flipping switches to bring the laser cannons online, muttering curses under his breath.

“Not the time for traditional tactics, Captain” said River flatly, sounding like a strategy officer instead of her usual semi-psychotic little-girl self. “They are going to swat us like a gadfly unless we disable their flyswatter.”

“You work on that,” said Mal, half listening.

“No hemlock today,” agreed River.

From outside the cockpit glass everyone could see Monty rashly deciding to be the one to fire the first shot, barely pinging the Alliance boat it hit, but apparently being enough for them to retaliate in full force.

“Incoming!” Zoe yelled into the comm. “Da jee-ah tzwo sha!” she shouted, and everyone on the bridge clutched onto something as the blast hit and caused a deep shuddering throughout the ship.

Zoe took over the cannon controls as Mal took the helm, Kaylee providing the speed needed as they attempted to dodge the Alliance shots and return fire.

Several blasts later, from all sides, more alarms were going off from the panels, and Zoe could smell the distinct smell of burnt wiring coming from down the corridor.

“I can’t jam them, I can’t jam them,” said River frantically as she continued to stab at the consol buttons, her eyes widening as she encountered a problem she couldn’t solve. Her hysteria suddenly dissolved as she gave a little giggle as she said, “But I can pour syrup on them.”

She punched more buttons and shouted into the comm., “Attention Annabel, you are about to lose all communications, repeat, Monty and crew, you are about to lose all communications. Follow us to reach safe harbor.”

River seemed to be doing two separate tasks with each hand as she accessed different systems, then, with more force than necessary, pressed one final button to activate her solution.

An almost perceptible electromagnet pulse went through the ether and a sickly sweet, syrupy pop music began to play, tweaked to a speeded up and high pitched level of squeakiness reserved for screaming hamsters onamphetamines, a sound beyond irritating, so bad it suggested an ice pick to the brain as a logical solution to make it stop.

“What the gorram-” bellowed Mal.

River flicked another switch and blessed silence followed.

“-hell,” he finished lamely in the quiet.

She smiled broadly. “All ships in the area will hear that and nothing else no matter what frequency they use. All abilities to send orders of any kind have been covered in that coding.”

“And when those Alliance patrol boats just turn their comms off too? What then?” he demanded.

“Then they can’t use their equipment – its either silence and do nothing, or attempt to work with the nánháizi yuè duì from hell tap dancing on their auditory senses.”

She grinned like an evil little cat, clearly enjoying someone else suffering scrambled brain patterns for a change. “They can’t talk to each other, or tell their ships what to do – or call for back up.” She turned back to the helm and began re-plotting their course. “But we need to get out of here. Now. Syrup will only buy so much time in a fight.”

Zoe glanced at the clock as River punched it; while the numbers showed that the whole incident from Monty’s hail to now as Serenity and Annabel high tailed it for Liberty had been less than ten minutes, it had felt so much longer.

Zoe breathed slowly and calmly, trying to will her adrenaline levels back down. She stood up, and promptly sat back down again, as a shooting pain lanced through her, so sudden and fierce that she couldn’t stop the groan of pain escaping her lips. Everyone immediately rushed towards her, with Mal bellowing down the corridor for Simon to get his pigu up to the bridge, pronto.

“I’m…” she began, but before she could get to the word ‘fine’ she felt something else, and realized her water had just broke. “Thanks for waiting,” she said ruefully, hand to her side as she felt the baby move again.

Fēicháng Cola – “Future Cola”, a real soda sold in China

Bhikkhuni – Buddhist nun

kuh wu - despicable

hwo gai - deserving of bad consequence or fate

jie-jie – older sister

da jeh da – female gang leader

zuò xiǎojiě – bargirl, slang for prostitute

Fei wu - Junk

To Ma Duh - Damn it

Ung jeong jia Ching Jien Soh - Filthy fornicator of livestock

Pigu – ass

Da jee-ah tzwo sha! Everybody sit down!

nánháizi yuè duì – boy band

bu yao ku rang ying huo chong dai zhe ni tao pao, xiang jian de ge yao yong yuan de yi kao, tong nian de zhi fei ji xian zai zhong yu fei hui wo shou li – Lyrics from the song Zoe listens to are from a Chinese pop song “Zhi Fei Ji” (Paper Plane) by Sandy Lam; lyrics translate to: “Don’t cry. Let the fireflies take you away / Leaning forever on the countryside´s ballad / Childhood’s paper plane flies from my hands.”