I've been around on FanFiction before, but I'm a first time Firefly writer. Please be gentle in your reviews, but please do review with any feedback!

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"Crazy on the loose?" Jayne asked suspiciously as he walked up to the bridge. He'd turned around (just for one second, mind you) to clean his guns and turned back to find that River had danced in and made herself at home in the corner of his room. He had no idea what the ruttin' Moonbrain meant by sitting herself there as though waiting for something, as though she was listening for something far off, but he had chased her out without a single word exchanged between them.

He shivered some thinking about those eyes. Girl had a pair of them on her, like holes all the way out in the black of space. Not his type, not at all. His type spoke little and without the crazy, and was a little less likely to bear down on him with a knife like he was a stubborn can of peaches.

"Haven't heard from her in an hour or two," said Zoë distractedly, referring her own sighting. River had stood in the doorway of their bunk, peering at them with big eyes like she wanted something from them.

Zoë was leaning her hip against Wash's chair, watching him mumble to himself about his dinosaurs. There had been a tenseness amongst the crew for a spell now, and this marked the first time Jayne had found himself up in the bridge in almost a week. First time he'd actually exchanged words with Zoë in two, but they weren't the most conversational of pairs. "Why, she having a hard day?"

"Nah, doc's just looking for her," he mumbled in excuse.

"What am I doing?" the very doctor came up behind him, looking open-faced and expectant at his mention. He hadn't been out from the infirmary in a while, and he had the tight look across his eyes that said he needed the conversation no one would give him.

Jayne excused himself without a word.

Mal was the next to get himself a visit from River. She planted herself like a tree on top of the chair next to him at the table and stared down at him, her swishy dress swaying around her like some sort of wind-stricken cluster of petals.

Like the rest of the crew, Mal had been keeping to himself. It had started with an outbreak of fights, but then dinner attendance had been dropping off. Just the night before it had been him and Kaylee, and yet another one of the little tiffs had broken out and she'd left to lick her wounds. Mal allowed himself to bask for a moment in the presence of another human being, one of the few who he hadn't seemed to have alienated himself from and hadn't seemed to have alienated herself from anyone on board.

"Can I do something for you, River?" he asked, glancing up from his cup.

She cocked her head sideways, and extending a hand, holding her index just inches from his forehead. "Baby birds learn songs from other birds and make it their own in the sky. Innate template, personal touch. They have to share."

He looked up at her, and contemplated calling for the doc. She seemed stable, but overly focused. You never could tell when she was going to go off, and while he hadn't seen much of her in the last while, neither had anyone else and her brooding never did the rest of them any favors.

"He isn't listening, doesn't understand," she whispered, almost to herself. Then, back to him, her hands wrapped around herself. "All the voices are so greedy. Not singing with each other. The warrior and the dinosaur whisper, whisper in their bunks, and the sunbeam listens to the little night-light but where has the singing gone? They crowded around the birdfeeders but they all took their turn, and music in the black and the girl hadn't heard music since they took it out of her feet with the dancing. Where has it gone? Where?"

She stamped her foot, causing the chair to rock alarming, and Mal reached her hands out to catch her, but she leapt of the chair before his hands reached her and landed gracefully.

Her eyes burnt hot into his. "Bring. Back. The. Music."

Her final visit was to Kaylee.

Kaylee found her perched in the hammock, and instead of shooing her out sat down beside her, nestling up against her comfortably. They'd sat like this several times, listening to Serenity together, and Kaylee had learned to take comfort from it. Following her fight with the Captain, she could use some company. Everyone was so mad these days, they'd been out in the Black too long. She missed the shiny days before.

"Is she singing?" River asked, sounding wavering and desperate.

Kaylee turned to her, worried. "Serenity? 'Course she's singin'. You can hear her, can't you?"

River nodded, but there were tremors in her shoulders.

"River, honey, what's the matter?" Kaylee wrapped her arm around the girl's thin shoulders.

"It's so quiet in her head…bring back the singing…"

Kaylee didn't get any more out of her than that, and they sat in quiet for a while before River stood up, freeing herself and staring right into Kaylee's eyes.

"And you even had such a pretty song. Serenity likes it, but she can share." Her face changed, morphed into a dazed, cross-eyed sort of happiness. "Come, let's hide in the silence!"

"River, I don't right know what you're…"

But she was gone, and Serenity seemed to hum almost in alarm.