Diverting River

By Lexandria

AN: This just randomly popped into my head yesterday, and I'm not sure if I will keep going with it or not. I have no planned plot, just a concept, so I'm sort of playing by ear. It has been many, many years since I have written fanfiction, so I'm a little surprised at myself.

I do not know if I will continue my other projects or not (Gateway to the Stars and Relativity), I might, but I'm finding that my planned plot for Relativity is rather bland and uninspired, and I still have not managed to recover my original plot map for Gateway.

So... Here's what I've gotten so far.

It often felt like floating. She moved from one side of the ship to another, bare feet picking out the perfect path upon the grating, and the metal felt cold and hummed warm and alive at the same time. Part of River knew, was aware, that there were no obstacles to create the need for the perfect path, but she needed to step just right all the same. Silent, soft, one foot straight, one cocked to the side. Then a step on her toes, the next as well, with a turn all the way about, then forward once more. It was just the path she was to take. Any other path was no good.

Because sometimes, instead of the ship, she was weaving between trees that swayed in the wind, or danced down an empty street, or paced in the garden at her parents' home. Only it was always still the ship, still Serenity, warm and alive and humming happily. Home. Always, always home.

Home was Simon and Kaylee, Inara and Mal, Zoe and Wash, Shepherd Book, and even Jayne who hated her.

And so she floated through her home, and no one noticed her. Often, this happened. Sometimes she really moved through, and sometimes she just thought she did. But her feet felt Serenity below her, and River knew that this was a real walk.

They were afraid of her, even though Jubal Early was gone and tumbling through space, alone with his thoughts and no one to hurt again. The feelings were still there, hiding, below the surface. River could see them, and sometimes she could not tell if what she was hearing was what was really happening, or what was lurking below. There was no grating for her feet when it came to words and actions of others. Nothing to ground her in real and not-real and could-be-real.

Kaylee and Simon were..together; Kaylee would not wish to play with her just now. No games of tag, but the smiles for Simon were enough. Being alone was difficult, but she was always mostly alone, anyway. Ever since the Academy. Alone but open and vulnerable and sharp all at once. Opened up and locked down.

She floated back to her room.

River was dreaming. She always knew when she was, because there would always be something that was not quite right. Even in the Academy, she knew. Something would be off, be wrong. One wrong word, one person knowing something they should not, something. Always something.

In this dream, it was that she was whole, not broken open like an egg that fell out of the nest: insides on the outside and nothing to protect her soft bits.

"Most do not know they are dreaming right away"

"I always know. Here I can express myself properly. But I know that you do not belong here, you are not a part of me. How are you in my head and in my dream?"

"Because I can be. Because I need to ask you to do something." The presence felt white, bright, like it would swallow her whole if she let it, and yet beautiful in its harshness.

"You would burn me with your light, if I saw you. Even here."

"Yes."

"Your brightness would burn me up, blow me out like a candle, and everyone else too, if they saw. I feel it.

"You are very perceptive. I am in need of your help, if you are wiling to give it."

"You could make me, without asking me to help."

"I could, but I wish for you to want to do it; I will not force you."

"I will wake soon, and will not make as much sense. You should hurry."

"You will, yes." the light seemed pleased, if light could have emotion. River thought that it aught not to be able to, and yet this one did. "I need to send you somewhere. I need for you to help change the path that broke the world."

"Will it change the now?"

"Yes and no. Your now will not be changed. The now of another timeline might be."

"This world is only one possibility in millions upon millions. Each possible path creates a new reality."

"Yes. I wish for you to change a different possibility. You can not change a timeline you are entrenched in, even so far in the past as I wish you to go. You are not any part of the timeline I wish you to alter, you can make changes others could not."

"Will I be like this? Less broken?"

"Perhaps. I cannot say. You will not be whole, but you may be better than you are now. You will likely not be worse."

"Simon would be sad for me to go."

"He will not know you are gone, if you are successful."

"Then I will have to be, won't I?"

River woke pleasantly. One moment she was talking with the brightest light, and the next she was slowly opening her eyes in the dark. There was a soft beeping sound, and something in her throat, and in her arm, and in many other places. Invading. Tubes and machines invading, like the Academy.

And she was afraid, terrified that Serenity and her rescue were all in her head. Another dream and another delusion for the broken girl to mourn. But if this were the Academy, they might not want her awake, might not know. The ones outside the door, talking quietly, thought she was asleep. Thought she was gone, thought she was empty and vacant.

"...severe brain trauma. There is a good possibility that she will never wake up. We can keep her here, on life support, if you wish" The doctor-man was saying to the crying people. A man and a woman, broken but not in the same way she was. Broken like Simon was when he rescued her and found her so very damaged. Broken like when her brother realized there was no way to fix her.

River held still, this was not the Academy. There were too many sad people here, dead and dying, but healing and growing too. There were some relieved people and happy people and excited people. New little people just coming into being, seeing and feeling for the first time. And most of the people here thought only of helping other people. Helping the sick ones.

Hospital.

The bright light said she needed to go somewhere else. Perhaps this was it? But she was lying in bed, while people who mourned for her but did not know her cried and thought she was dead.

"Can't you do something? Anything? She can't be.. she can't be gone, can she?" the woman, the mother, was crying now. The man hugged her protectively, though he grieved too. Little pieces of their hearts died tonight, River could feel them. It made her sad too, she felt their sorrow and wished it weren't so.

But if they mourned for her, should she not tell them she was alive?

"You should not. You are not here to be their daughter." The light spoke to her mind, and River understood only partially. It seemed to know and continued, "Your body does not exist here. This one will do for your soul to reside, it was the nearest I could find in this timeline to your physical makeup, as well as contains the capability for your mental abilities to work."

Brain damage, the doctor-man had said something about brain damage.

"Yes." The light answered again before she could speak. Except that with the tube down her throat she couldn't speak anyway. "I have repaired the other injuries for you, but only brought the brain back so far. It is near to your true body's current configuration."

If it could heal her, though, why had the light not given those people back their daughter? They were so sad: they needed her to be whole again.

"Her soul has moved on. They were meant to lose her, that can not be changed in this timeline, not by me. You have more important things to do than to play at being their daughter, River Tam. Sleep. When you wake, it will be time to leave."

There was no fighting the command. Like a switch, she was turned off, powered down. A machine not yet ready to work...

When River-the-Machine was turned back on, it was dark. Or, rather it was darker than it had been before. The lights in the hallway had been dimmed, not dark but not so bright, and there was nothing but the steady beeping of equipment. River knew it was time to leave.

Careful careful, she pulled the tube up out of her throat, coughing as it felt like vomiting plastic and choking all at once. She'd swallowed something too big and now it was killing her. Then it was out, and her lips stung from the tape that had held part of it in place. The needles next, and the other tubes that violated her in undignified ways. Last was the important one, the one on her finger that she knew, in the way she always knew things, would sound an alarm and make people run once she pulled it off.

That steady beep was her heart beat, the finger-thing had a cord that ran to that machine. River looked around, felt around without moving, and knew when the nurses were farthest away. Then, she yanked her finger monitor off and bolted.

Down the hallway, around a corner, into the bathroom and up to stand on the toilet. No feet to see under, no way to know. But she was one, and they were many, and she was in a paper gown. Easy to see, easy to know. They would see and she would be made into the daughter of those sad people.

No, that was not why she was here. The brightest light did not want her to be made into a daughter.

There was an air duct, above. Not easy to reach, but she could. She was not like other people, she could do things they couldn't.

Up. Up. Feet splayed between the two flimsy metal walls between toilets, River balanced, bare toes gripping and supporting. Wiggle and push, the grate popped in, she hauled herself up like emerging from a pool. Grating back in place. Hidden in the walls. Like in Serenity. Safesafesafe.

But she did not know these parts of this building, old and large and sad with sick and dying held precariously within. Not safe like Serenity, not safe like home. But safe enough.

River wriggled, graceful little worm, through the shaft, following the only path. There were many she could have gone, but this was the only one, the only right one. Yes. This way. This way and then that other way.

This empty girl she occupied moved like she remembered being able to move, and she could feel that she was not better, not fixed. But the light had said that this body was damaged as her body was, that it would be the same, or as same as it could get. The girl in the mirror was not her, though somewhat similar. Similar height, similar build, dark hair, pale skin, long limbs, very flexible. And she could feel the frantic feelings of the people who found her gone, all the searching, the looking, the peeking into rooms and calling of higher authorities.

It seemed best to wait until it had all died down, the search had stopped, before emerging to find her next perfect path. Waiting was her path, now, waiting and watching until the time was right again.