Dead. Stagnant.

That has been my creative writing these past few weeks, and to my horror, I have diagnosed my lack of writing as writer's block.

This is horrible to be struck down with when you have five to ten stories that you want to write on and suddenly have no idea where you were going with them.

So to resuscitate my skills, I have asked Killerladybug to give me a fandom, a pairing, and twenty words.

She gave me Firefly, Simon Tam and Malcolm Reynolds, with the following list:

Kittens, Loose, Kaylee, toilet, food, chopstick, lost, hairball, clawing, demon, blood, cuddling, Jaynisms, snark, flying dogs, boots, haircut, wrestling, monster, Viagra.

Happy?

Now fuck off and let me eat in peace, you annoying little twit.

I love you too, killerladybug.

And for the readers, these are not in chronological order. Neither do I own Firefly!

~Kittens~

Back on Osiris, being a Veterinarian had been an option. Simon had turned it down, preferring to learn only the human body and attain the position of trauma surgeon.

One training option was to work in a Veterinary clinic, so when his parents had told him to 'try something new' Simon had written River about trying out the Veterinary clinic, where rabbits and cats and dogs were brought in. Mostly to be groomed.

But he was there when they brought in a dying bloodhound. Getting the dog to calm down and then treat the wound…that was a new concept. Usually, humans were restrained and then knocked out with a noninvasive drug to the operation. Those were tricky, given how the drugs had a habit of messing with each other.

But with animals, it wasn't the same.

Now here he was, in a famer's house while Mal and the others are away to help clean up the local crime for some bartering goods, helping a mother of four children birth a litter of kittens. She mentions that maybe Simon would want to take one, and even the fleeting thought of arguing with Mal on the merits of the animal is enough to give him a headache.

Even if, after birthing five healthy kittens, the thought of Mal getting a midnight spook from one of the felines isn't enough to change his mind.

Besides, the cat would need to be entertained, fed, and cleaned up after. Simon has enough jobs running the clinic and helping his sister, tracking the compounds and her reactions. Sure, a kitten would ease his worries about River and the Alliance, but more than likely, the kitten would only add to his worries and troubles later.

He just smiles and thanks her politely, citing that some of the crew had allergies. The woman smiles, and then a sixth kitten pops out. That one is cleaned and set up to find her mother's milk.

Simon sits with the animals, watching over the birth. He hears Mal, Zoe, and Jayne ride in around dawn, bringing with them the proof of the firefight. The bodies are identified and numbered, the local Mayor deeming that justice has been done, while Book asks to pray over the deceased.

Nearly all of the stolen supplies have been recovered, but the supplies were stolen weeks ago.

Zoe voices that maybe the raiding was to pay tribute to a larger group, if the thieves weren't going to use it. They cleaned out the stores, and checked for hidden rooms in the caves.

The town folk thank them, and Simon has a prickling feeling. The kind of prickling feeling he got from a set up he saw back in med school, where some bullies had set up their competition in the school to be shut down by an outside party.

Simon scolds himself. He knows better. He's a doctor, not a psychology expert. Besides, what would the village have a group of five men exterminated over? This is a simple farming facility. There's nothing to kill over. The oxen are too plentiful, there's fresh water, and more land than can be either bought or preserved.

Turning his mind back to earning his keep, Simon finishes cleaning the bed and the kittens curl back into their mother. The farmer's wife is smiling, cooing over how beautiful they are and what perfect rat catchers they'll grow up to be.

Simon finishes helping with the hands in the field and goes to check up on the kittens again.

He stands quietly in the doorway when he sees a brown coat.

Mal is sitting by the kittens, just watching them. The sunlight is coming in through the chinks in the board, highlighting the captain and the make shift birth box, trailing dust motes from the straw.

Simon clears his throat.

"Time to go. We've been paid."

"Right. Um, my stuff is still on Serenity, so no need to pack." Like any of his medical instruments weren't designed for humans.

"Shiny."

Mal stands up and heads towards Simon, who steps out of the way for the captain to pass.

Then he follows him back to the ship.

He'll ask Mal why the nest was set inside a larger box some other time.

Loose~

It never bothered Simon when he put on new clothes and they didn't fit as well as they should. He would dog ear some money to go to the tailor and get the fittings made.

That was back on Osiris.

Now, he takes care to mend his clothes with skill each time that there's a small rip. He's had practice with the needle in flesh, it isn't too hard to adapt to cloth.

Jayne jibes him as a girl, and Simon, without thinking, "Well, my mother doesn't send me care packages because she loves me, so I do it and provide for River."

There's silence in the communal dining hall.

Simon doesn't dare to look up until he's finished sewing and tying off the thread. He fingers the buttons, looking for a loose one that he can fix, buys himself some time.

Not finding any, he looks up at the crew. Kaylee was getting some more hooch, Zoe was sitting with Wash, and Jayne was down at the other end of the table.

Sheppard was looking after River while Simon handled a needle and Mal was off somewhere else.

The others were poised, watching him.

"Ah, sorry. That was out of line." Then Simon, the sewing kit, and the vest are down the hall past Wash and headed towards the clinic.

He doesn't want to go past Jayne, because he might have snapped out of it and said something. Whatever 'it' is.

He tests the strength with a few sharp tugs, and then folds the vest and puts it away. The kit is assembled and set up neatly. First his room is fastidiously cleaned, and then he checks River's room, drops by Book's room to let him now he can take River, but she's fixing the Bible, so he leaves without her.

He holes up in the clinic. It's after dinner, so no one should come looking for him. Maybe they'll behave like he never said anything in the morning. It's what his parents would do.

Somehow he has the nagging feeling that the crew isn't like his family as he cleans and documents the clinic again. He's optimizing the space in the closet with the thermal blankets when someone clears their throat behind him.

He does not whirl around at the sound. Instead, he motions for them to come in, and finishes organizing the closet.

"I heard that you said something slightly off to the crew, earlier."

Damn. It's Mal. If only he was just in for a scolding.

"I wasn't trying to be insulting. I just compared Jayne's mother to mine, and I didn't mean it to sound so harsh. I apologize, and I'll write a letter of apology to Jayne's mother if that's necessary."

He turns toward Mal, but he's looking slightly over Mal's shoulder, not wanting to see the expression there.

"I think there's been a misunderstanding. Jayne wants to apologize to you."

"Well, there certainly has been a misunderstanding. Jayne wasn't out of line. He was being his usual self."

"So, let's hear it, then."

"I'm sorry?"

"Your side of what happened."

"Uhm. Jayne called me a girl for fixing my clothes, so I said, 'my mother doesn't send me care packages since she doesn't love me', apologize, and left."

Mal has that thoughtful stance, where his thoughts are on his face, so he turns it to the floor, and widens his stance. Usually when he widens his stance, it's to take a step forward to the problem or the solution, that he's encountering.

Right now, Simon's on the receiving end. Please don't let the solution be to drop him and River off at the nearest settlement. Those back water planets had once sought to burn her as a witch, and they weren't even on the planet for twenty-four hours.

"So, Jayne's the one that needs to be apologizing."

"I said that Jayne-"

"He wants to, Simon. To him, a loveless mother is a greater sin than killing people. He didn't mean to inflict that kind of harm on you."

"No, it's alright. My parents, that is, they would brag about us at dinner parties, so, it's okay."

He hadn't meant for that to come out so chopped up. He usually delivered his lines almost scripted, perfectly, to be said and forgotten. Now Mal is even closer, and suddenly, the tar smooth lines are clogging in his throat.

This is ridiculous.

Mal gives him a look.

"It is not ridiculous. Sometimes life isn't shiny, but that shouldn't drag down the rest of your life. Come on, let Jayne apologize. Everyone's dying to see it actually happen."

Simon feels a look crack over his expression. He can't name what's going through his face or his emotions, so he follows Mal back into the dining room, where Jayne has obviously been given pointers by the others, and stammers out a whole apology. What he's sorry for saying and why he's sorry.

Simon feels a smile actually come across his face.

"Thank you, Jayne." And then the feeling's too tight, and Simon doesn't know if he's crying, but he's too strong to faint. So Jayne shuffles forward and Simon shakes his hand, and that is the end of that.

River stands in the doorway, her hand up to keep Book from interrupting by asking what had her tearing out without most of John finished. He stands behind her, watching the quiet reminiscing of family going on.

Then River is padding in and sitting next to Simon, her head resting on his shoulder, and Book remains in the doorway.

Kaylee~

She's the ship mechanic, and Mal's known her longer. River keeps disappearing and giggling with her, Inara plays with her, and even Zoe will side with her. Wash treats her like a sister, and Jayne treats her like the annoying cousin you know you will remember outside of the family annual get-togethers.

Simon doesn't know how to treat her. Well, medically, he can treat her alright. Any other conditions for the stomach wound that first trip; he could treat her just fine. But she's reassured him that River is worth being shot in the stomach, and Simon knows how close he came to breaking the Hippocratic Oath, but he just can't forget how chipper she is.

How Kaylee defies the danger she is in by association and chooses to dwell on the positives has Simon hoping that one day, River will be better.

He gave up on his parents a long time ago, and clings tightly to his only family left. But even as River progresses to being better, Kaylee still wanders into his clinic. She reciprocates by inviting him into the engine room sometime.

Respectively, Serenity belongs to Captain Mal. But Simon and Kaylee have also laid claim to the ship. Simon to the clinic, and Kaylee to her engine room. Kaylee takes care of the ship, while Simon takes care of the crew that takes care of the ship.

He still doesn't know what to make of her, though.

Toilet~

It is with great concentration that Simon is able to figure out the toilets in one of the four bathrooms, not counting the two in the shuttles. There's one for the Captain's private use, one for the rest of the main crew, one for the passengers, and another between the cargo bay and the kitchen that's hardly ever used.

He's hardly ever been on a ship that had a bathroom before, and not one of the Firefly design, either.

Of course, being in the top three percent of his class means he figures how to work the facility to do his business, wash his hands, and dry them.

Now it's time to check on River, and pray that Whitefall isn't some kind of trap.

Food~

Saffron was a damn good cook. She managed to make cider, and a meal that Wash was still going on about under his breath while he fixed the wires.

Mal was out picking up the shuttle.

Inara made her way back to her shuttle, and Simon decided that if she didn't hit her head too hard when she fell, then she should be alright.

Of course, even in the captain's messy quarters, there were no signs of a collision, and she was too far away to have hit her head on anything. That and the lack of hair ripped out on a corner and generally hissing in pain meant Inara was keeping something under wraps, and Simon decided not to pry.

Instead, Simon mused quietly to himself why, as a doctor who could mix up the best medicines without sending his patient into cardiac arrest, he couldn't figure out how to cook. Certainly, he let the maids cook for him back home, or had the prepared meals in the mess hall when he was studying, or went out to eat, or ate at a buffet, (he was never going to take strawberries for granted again) but certainly if he could chemically create medicine, he should be able to cook.

The process wasn't that hard.

Then again, there wasn't much more than protein and cans in the kitchen, so he stayed out of there after taking stock of everything they had.

He had heard of scarcity driving up the prices, thanks to an economics class where 'demand and supply' determined the price and the overall economy. So after seeing five dollars for some spices that he could get for a dime total back home, Simon stayed away from cooking.

Then Zoe decided to divvy up chores.

Simon was fine with cleaning the hangar after asking Kaylee if she could give him tips while she worked on it, before Mal talked Zoe into letting Kaylee's only job be the engine room. After that, Simon scrubbed bathrooms and the hangar on his own for the next few weeks.

Then Sheppard chased him out and quietly discussed with Mal off to the side that Simon shouldn't be working any harder. Book handled the cleaning along with his clergy duties from then on.

But that still left the cooking.

Kaylee's food was best eaten with her beaming smile and gulps of her inter-engine moonshine. Jayne somehow set the kitchen on smoke. There was no fire, and after scouring down the kitchen with cleaning solution from the clinic, Simon deemed the kitchen usable. All that the kitchen suffered was a little fire damage.

For some reason, the crew ate in the hangar bay while Wash or Book cooked in the kitchen the next day. Zoe made a blunt comment about how the kitchen smelled like the clinic now. Simon nodded, before collecting the rest of his food.

He had lost his appetite. Zoe sent a significant look at Mal, who sighed at Simon's core upbringing, and went after him.

"I'm not a gorram baby-sitter, and I ain't coddling him." He grumbled.

"He respects you, Mal." Inara called back. "You're the authority figure here. Simon doesn't quite answer to my respect or the Sheppard's prayers, no matter how grateful he is for our support."

When Mal steps back into the kitchen, he sees Simon's posture first. He is set and determined. Then he gets around Simon's back. Simon has scrapped his food into a pan and has turned on the heater. Then he leaves it.

It isn't that Simon is ignoring the pan, he just doesn't fiddle with it after that, beyond checking it. Soon, the burnt smell of food comes into the air.

Simon then starts fiddling with the stove and a water bottle and the food, until the smell of burnt food has overlapped the smell of clinic cleaner.

Then he douses the food in his glass of water in the sink. The smoke billows up more steam and smell.

"Well, that's more appetizing then the cleaner smell."

Simon looks up and sees Mal after he makes the comment.

"…just like the doctor ordered. I couldn't stand being the cause of their discomfort after everything they've done for me."

Mal wonders if now would be the time to point out that Simon's done them several favors. For one, the kid keeps to himself. For another, he keeps up his part of the deal. For another, they found him on the same pyre if not tied to the same stake as his sister.

That had earned him some points in 'gutsy', even if the points were rightly accumulated under 'stupid'.

Simon leaves his dinner in the sink and goes to his bed for the night.

Chopstick~

Inara's hair is so long, that when she borrowed a pair of working clothes from Kaylee to see what was so fun outside without ruining her clothes, her hair quickly became a deterrent to her fun.

Mal was content to watch her talk with Kaylee on the matter about tying her hair in a knot. Who knew a woman could come up with so many reasons why tying her hair up were a short term solution and a long term problem with knots and tangles and snarls.

Simon stood up from watching River, and nodded to Sheppard. Then he was walking over to Inara. He had something in his hands, and for one wild moment Mal thought Simon was going to offer to cut her hair.

Then he bent over Inara and whispered something to her. She smiled and removed her hands. Simon gathered the strands up, before twisting them into a rope, silky smooth, and then wrapped it into a bun.

Then he ran two thin objects through, and her hair stayed in place. A little loose, but nothing she couldn't fix.

Inara says thank you to Simon, because Mal can see it in the way she curves back from her position on the ground, and Simon says a polite you're welcome. Twenty paces later and he's back in the shade where he can watch River.

"What was that?" Zoe queries, snuggled into Wash.

"Some clean chopsticks. It's quite the fashion statement, with lacquered sticks and designs, carvings, sometimes even precious jewels. But basically the hair holds itself up with the tension around the chopsticks and it should stay put. If not, she's more than capable of designing her hair herself."

"Then why'd you put it in?"

Mal was not sounding invasive, or territorial. That was not how it came out at all. He was genuinely curious how an independent woman like Inara had Simon putting her chopsticks in her hair.

"Because she was comfortable and deserves some pampering." Simon answers. He blinks in surprise at Mal's question before the answer falls out of his mouth, as though he was saying 'the sky is blue because of the atmosphere' to a scientist.

Mal does not feel jealous that he has a crew cut and doesn't sit in comfortable positions.

Lost~

Sometimes when Simon wakes up, he's disoriented for a moment. He thinks he's at home first, but the blankets aren't right. Then he thinks he's at his dorm, but the walls are too wide and the wrong metal, and there certainly aren't enough books. There also isn't a half naked hall mate wake up call.

Oh wait.

A shirtless Mal is standing in his door way, yelling something.

"And you were too out of it to notice you contracted the gorram flu until you dropped!"

"Dad?"

Simon's voice sounds in the emptiness, and he realizes that he's actually on the table in the clinic. He's only been on it once before when he was shot in the leg trying to save River. Of course, he had not taken painkillers, and had been awake for the full operation before dropping off thanks to the fact that he only had three hours of sleep.

Now he's swimming against the usual feel of a high fever and grogginess.

"Ugh, thermometer's in the drawer with the only sanitizing supplies because it's got a sheath, the tongue, not the probe, thanks, and then some soup and decongestants and I'll be back on my feet."

He attempts to sit up to point out which drawer which sets off an itch in his throat. Simon swallows several times to avoid the coughing, but then there's no stopping it.

A minute of explosive coughs later and Zoe's riffled through all the drawers to find the thermometer and hands him a glass of water and the instrument. After swallowing some, the thermometer goes under his tongue and he lies back for five minutes.

He's so far from home, he has to take care of himself when he gets sick or injured around here. He should have told Kaylee no again, instead of 'just one game, it's only a feeling of a long day' and tried to sleep off the invasion before it set in.

Oh wait, that's infection. Or was it a virus? Regardless, muddled thinking was part of the flu. Zoe was saying something about an IV bag, and Simon had to bring himself back to reality.

Oh, reality hurt.

"No. IV bags are strictly for gunshot wounds, especially to replace any blood loss and dehydration that occurred. I am in my right mind, no overruling me, and besides, there isn't enough to waste on a fever and a runny nose. That's all I have to deal with. Heck, if it wasn't for the fact I don't want to pass this on to others, I'd be in my quarters. However, the clinic has a separate air flow for isolation and containment, and laying out the whole crew from the flu is something we cannot have. For one, we would have to be planet side. It's dangerous to fly in the black when you want to sleep through it, and Kaylee being unable to rewire the on panel is straight out of a nightmare. I'm rambling, so I'm shutting up. Just some soup, or just broth, some bed rest, and I should be over this in a day or two."

He did not want to talk about how dry and scratching his voice sounded. He sounded worse than he was.

"I think he's raving, sir." Zoe looked at Mal, who was staring into the space between himself and the doctor.

Tired of talking, Simon grabbed the mug of water and knocked it back.

"I. Am. Not. Raving. Water. Soup broth. Sleep. Trust me, I'm a doctor."

The effect would have been grander if some of the water hadn't run over his mouth and down the side of his chin and from there to his shirt.

Zoe carefully put the IV away, and set the saline bag aside. Then she stepped out.

Simon lay back down, satisfied that his marching orders would be obeyed.

"Your dad sat with you through your fever?"

Simon didn't bother opening his eyes. Instead, he slipped under the aches and pains into the healing sleep he knew awaited him.

After all, he had been current on his vaccinations before he left Osiris. He wasn't going to get River away from the Alliance to allow the common cold or some plague remnants take him away from her.

So instead of the week of aches and pains, he gave himself forty-eight hours before he would be in working order.

He spent the majority of those hours under, swimming back to consciousness for a few moments to sip at broth, and at one time woke up to River playing with his hair before she kissed his forehead and curled up on the side bed. He woke up even later to a thermal blanket tucked over him.

Sometimes, when he felt lost, he thought he heard the words, 'why are we still talking about this? He's part of the crew.'

When he wakes up, he asks Mal who went against his orders and gave him the saline solution intravenously.

Mal raises his eyebrows and says he has no idea who would have that knowledge to hang a bag correctly and run it into a vein.

Simon grunts, and then bluntly tells him that he's down to four saline bags, so please don't get into any firefights getting paid, otherwise they might not last long enough to spend the money on anything.

He doesn't feel lost so long as he has a purpose to guide him.

Hairball~

Jayne has deemed what they wake up to as the sound of Serenity hacking up a hairball. Kaylee argues for something more dignified, but all Simon could think was that if Kaylee ever heard a cat heaving to get a hairball out of its chest and onto the floor, she would agree.

Mal was looking around Serenity, letting his hand drift across her.

"Maybe something's not passing through the piping, or not enough of something." Simon mutters out loud.

Kaylee gives him a look.

"Ah, sorry. As a doctor, trying to diagnose what's wrong in a patient is rude without consulting the family physician."

No one appreciated his dry humor.

But everyone stopped worrying and started working to find out what was wrong. The next fourteen hours were spent convincing Kaylee to eat parts of a sandwich, and getting Mal to pace and count the sounds, to see if there was a pattern.

River started climbing through the duck work, and Simon decided to leave her to her work.

Sheppard Book prayed for their safe voyage, and after an aghast sound from Kaylee, prayed for Serenity's health. Zoe was with Wash on the bridge, seeing if the cause could be determined from the ship's log.

It's Simon who notices the odd draft.

"Uhm, is there supposed to be a draft here?" He calls out. The others come running, and turn the corner just in time to see Serenity retch her last six years worth of engine oil on the young doctor.

Simon pats the cracked plumbing that had frozen and expanded and frozen again.

"Feel better?"

An echoing retch and another line of oil answered him.

Kaylee rigs around the oil and Wash gets them in for new parts (second hand, but from the way Kaylee squealed, good as new) and even manages to get a free appraisal without underhanded stunts (mostly because the garage workers were laughing at Simon washing the oil off of himself) with some purchased oil.

"And in another six years, we'll know what it sounds like when we forget to get her some new oil and clean out the old oil." Wash declares.

Simon nods.

"Well, you were right about consulting the family physician to find out what was wrong." Kaylee chirps up, waving a hand at the mechanics all around them.

Clawing~

There aren't many dreams River has that leave her screaming in reality.

That didn't mean that the few that did were a rare occurrence.

What was rare was River bouncing into the room, with Simon shuffling in, moving like he had sprained his back.

"You okay?"

"I'm fine. Nothing some numbing ointment won't cure. Soon as I find it." Simon replies, easing himself into a chair. He sets down the wax board and a stylus, before he begins to make a list with short, concise movements.

Wash pales.

"Uhm, you won't find any. I used the last of it. I wrote it down, and even left some money."

Simon has that 'ahhh' face of enlightenment.

"He gave it to me, honey. I put it back." Zoe informed him. "A more detailed note might have been needed."

Shifting the focus away from him, Wash asked, "What do you need it for?"

"River was giving small screams in her sleep, so I went to wake her up. She came up; I fell over, and had an unfortunate fall."

Simon gives the smile that asks they don't pry for details.

River hands him a cup of warm water, and Simon thanks her. She leaves, and when Simon starts to follow, she makes stay motions with her hands, and then follows Sheppard Book when he walks by.

"So what really happened?" Zoe demands.

"She came up swinging, which was very different. I'm putting the change down to her psyche and not the drugs I have her on, and she recovered from the nightmare better than before."

Zoe levels Simon with her Cool GazeTM . Simon holds out for a moment, and then he caves.

"She was still asleep, screaming nonsense, but not with volume, more with emphasis. She followed me to the floor, and," Simon moved to shrug his shoulder, caught himself, and stopped. "She raked her nails on me. She more flailed me than actually hurt me, but now it hurts a lot more."

"Off." Zoe demanded.

"I'm sorry?"

"Take you shirt off." She ordered.

Simon squirmed, and then he sighed. Standing up slowly, he unbuttoned his vest from the bottom, and then his shirt from the top.

Kaylee stepped forward and removed his vest, folded it in half, and draped it over the chair, and then his shirt followed.

There were bruises, red lines, and peels of dead skin. A few beads of blood as well.

"Infirmary. Now." Zoe barked.

Simon kept from flinching, and dutifully shuffled off to the infirmary.

Mal stepped down the steps as they left.

"What did I just miss?"

"Simon trying to cover up the fact he was injured." Kaylee neutrally answered. After all, River had attacked him in her sleep.

Chances were she would never cognately attack them, and Simon had enough on his plate without being chewed out by a threatened captain.

She blushed and swept up the vest and shirt, before she hustled out of there.

Mal shrugged and went about breakfast.

"These look like you turned on your stomach so she couldn't claw your face." Zoe states as Simon lies on his back. She has the bottle of hydrogen peroxide, and is applying it liberally.

Simon keeps his hisses to himself as she picks off the dead skin and applies butterfly tapes to the worst of it.

"She didn't realize it was me. But all she was doing was snarling or half screaming and always hitting. I didn't want to interrupt her progress."

Zoe pours the cleaning solution on him, and uses the cotton balls to spread it around. Simon braces his teeth, rather than grit them or bite his check of tongue, which could get messy.

"Uhm, are you applying it right? Or is this because it covers such a wide area?" Kaylee asks from the doorway.

"No. This is because he was being an idiot." Zoe says tartly. "And we'll keep the fact River beat her brother to ourselves for now. If this happens again, we will be telling the captain."

"She was asleep. And this is progress, not a regression. A regression would be letting the nightmares control her. Instead, she's finding a way to fight back, literally. Once she realized it was me, she said sorry, and we just went back to sleep."

Kaylee lays the garments on the counter. When Simon dries, she helps him back into his clothes.

Then she leaves for the engine room, and Simon tries not to wince every time he puts weight into each leg.

But it's his turn to watch River, who lies quiet on the couch.

He wakes up to Mal saying,

"That's one humanoid safety-blanket."

The pain that sears up his back (it isn't his spine, it's the irritated skin and the chafing) and River murmurs, "Nightmares don't only come to those with problems. They are real to those with worries, too."

And then she gently pushes him back down, somehow avoiding the pain that wakes him up. Simon mutters about watching her doesn't give him nightmares.

"Only the kind you don't wake up from." She murmurs back.

Mal looks around for a way to break the awkward sibling bonding moment.

"You aren't a brat, River. Doesn't matter."

Great. Now the Doctor's lost it in the head.

"Some nightmares are physical manifestations." River murmurs. "Like claw marks." She looks at Mal. "Skin deep, but the pain goes through to the brain, and by-passes the heart."

Mal wonders if it's safe to leave Simon in the hands of his sister, and pulls up a chair.

Other captain-y things can wait for a few hours.

Demon~

Hardly anyone believes that Reavers are actually men. They hear the stories, but there are never survivors. The man that nearly killed Malcolm Reynolds certainly did not look like a man.

But there are more demons, Simon muses. Those men that chased him and River through the facility, killing anyone who saw them. They had filled him with terror, and he wondered how River lived with herself, possibly knowing what those men want.

Then there are the demons that Jayne possesses, that nearly led to the capture. Everywhere Simon looks, there are demons.

His parents, who have such a conditional love for their perfect children, would be exhibit A. Truly, as a trauma surgeon, Simon knew that sin existed in the world. Part of why Christianity was still alive and strong today.

But he had always thought himself safe from those evils. Naïve, true, but he had a family, and he worked to save people from accidents, evil intentions, or their own stupidity, in general giving back to the community. He saved lives so that people could have a second chance.

But now he lived the life of a fugitive. On the run, most likely wanted dead for interrupting the tests on River, and hiding out in a den of thieves.

The odd part was, the thieves were the least demonic of the people he had met. They actually were upright, loyal, honest, true, and generally did not shoot first unless threatened.

They had more morals than Simon felt hoisted upon for his family name.

How strange that, in a world where he would be living with Demons, he was surrounded by Angels.

Angels that packed pistols and fists and knives when wanting an informant to rat out how he knew which shuttle was Inara's, and was currently in Simon's hands to be patched up for another round of questioning.

He was surrounded by Demons.

Frankly, his Demonic looking Angels were by far the better people.

Blood~

Mal deals with blood fairly well. He survived the war, he survived Unification Day. He survives pretty much every deal that goes south or succeeds.

He's seen wounds, received wounds, and dealt wounds. He's seen blood trickle, spurt, surge, and beat out of a chest. He's seen it simmer, and cool, crust, and flake. He's seen it pink in water and brown without enough water. He's seen veins blue and green under skin, and sometimes not under skin.

He's seen the pain that comes with the presence of blood. How doctors would look overworked and too tired on the battlefield, but would still schlep to the next victim. Those doctors were emotional, and would sit by the dying soldiers to ease their passing, unless there were on their feet the whole time getting the living into stable condition.

Simon's eyes are focused.

The first time Mal is able to watch Simon work he notices the steady hands that all doctors seem to possess. Then he notices the set mouth. His mouth always shifts when he talks, but when he works, it's a concentrated line. His brow is clear, as though he doesn't even need to reach for the information to know what the patient needs to fully recover, even though he's still in the process of removing the bullet and hearing about how it happened this time.

Then Mal drops his gaze back into Simon's face after seeing Jayne is well and truly out.

And he notices that Simon's eyes are focused in a detached manner.

The first thought that goes through him is that Simon doesn't see the matter, but then he chases it away. Simon sees enough to fix Jayne, and that's all that's needed.

It's over the next few weeks that Mal realizes that the expression Simon has is for when he is immersed in his work. It isn't that Simon is removed from the experience.

It's that Simon is submerged in it.

Mal thought he had seen blood in his life. Had tasted it in his mouth from a clenched fist.

Simon bathes in blood, and swims in an ocean of it. He has knowledge where Mal has practical advice.

Mal sips water, rinses, and spits out the copper taste of his own blood.

That stray thought that never has any real hold in reality, and just wanders up through the subconscious, meaning some unrecognized part of your brain is wondering,

Does Simon drink blood?

Mal squashes the musing. It was innocent enough, but he tells himself firmly no, Simon does not drink blood; he's just handled it more.

The idea is promptly thrown into the mental bin and taken out. The trick is to do it without acknowledging the idea; otherwise the idea just has a key to the back door and lets itself in with reinforcements.

Mal watched Simon the next few months. His conclusion is that Simon must simply be out of his league, he's very good at what he does, and maybe it's a top three percent thing to be so focused.

He asks Simon over dinner one night what it actually means to be in the top three percent. Zoe rolls her eyes and tells him to phrase it bluntly, so that Mall will let it drop.

"I don't know if I could do it bluntly, because that would just mean, I'm in the top three percent. You know, 98, 99, and 100. But I could do it morbidly, if that doesn't upset you. It's a rather," Simon makes a face, "tasteless description, but after the professor phrased it, everyone paid closer attention to study hall."

Zoe hmphs. "I doubt you can put us off our dinner, doc."

"Okay. Imagine a room full of a hundred people. The best get the best prize in the end, and rank determines prize. Now turn them loose on each other in a fight. I would be one of the three people left of the hundred sitting on the mound of the other's bodies. They actually had to curve the grades." Simon's mouth twists between a grimace and quirk of the lips.

"Two point three five." River announces from down the table.

"If you wanted to be technical, there would only be two people capable of challenging me from y class." Simon admitted.

"What about the professor? Ain't he a contender?" Jayne pipes up from down the table.

"Hardly. Someone has to grade the fights. Especially when they happen so many times." Simon clarifies.

"Nice metaphor, but I can hardly see you winning a fight, doc." Mal ribs him.

"Five bullies in middles school and the teacher never saw." River announces proudly.

"Not all at once, River." Simon starts with mild surprise. "And it was hardly bullying. Just kid stuff."

"There was blood. You swallowed it. They got scared and ran away."

Okay, now that was freaky.

Simon sighed.

"There was a dare. Whoever bit through their hand had to drink their own blood. It was something passing through like a wild rumor, a feat of strength or something stupid all the others wanted to do. I was consecutively blackmailed into these 'duels' of sorts, and I always lost because I would refuse."

Mal rolled his eyes.

"And then the teacher was bit by a poisonous snake, so I sucked the blood out. There was no time to spit the blood out and keep drawing out the impurities, because you could see were the mutagens had caused the venom to actually burn off the flesh, so I just drank it."

Mal paused.

"You can look it up on the Cortex. I'm not lying."

Kaylee has the Cortex up and running in record time. She finds the article and reads it aloud.

The crew sat around in stunned silence.

"It says here that the teachers recovered." Kaylee trails off.

"Mmm. Yeah, she did. Later I learned that sucking snake venom out of a bit doesn't actually work, but that it's rare for a poisonous snake to inject their venom. She was more likely to die of a panic attack and blood loss. As it was, she calmed down and they were able to give her blood straight from a donor."

Simon shrugged.

"I've just never seen what the big deal about blood is since then."

Cuddling~

Simon does not cuddle. He curls up around River to sooth her, but he's never cuddled. His father would read to him and River, but that wasn't cuddling.

Cuddling to Simon meant that you cared for and were reciprocated by the same person. In her current state, all he could do was care for River.

He didn't have physical interaction with the others.

Jayne would slap him on the back, or Wash would sling an arm over his shoulders when explaining something. When he fell asleep, he woke to Inara watching him and the blanket pulled down over him.

Sheppard Book would give him a comforting hand.

Kaylee always looked like she wanted to get more from him, but wasn't pushy in her regards to do so.

Simon was cleaning up the infirmary when they were boarded forcefully. He heard the hangar door open, and so he opened his ears to see if Jayne was coming for more advice.

He didn't recognize the tread.

Punching in for the brig, Simon hissed 'stay on the line'. He was unconscious when the bandits where rounded up and shot. Apparently, Mal, Zoe, Wash and Jayne had been on the bridge when the bandits came in.

Simon considered himself lucky that one of them shot his mouth off in the Infirmary and was backhanded before he slipped under from the pistol whip.

Waking up in Mal's bed hadn't been what he expected.

"Infirmary's full, we had to put you somewhere and keep that iced. They jumped the wrong ship."

"Bad for them or bad information?"

Mal shrugged in the chair he'd pulled up.

"Both."

Simon nods. "Well, I'll get out of your hair, check on River, and see if they stole anything from the infirmary."

"I'm sorry?"

"I'm leaving. I'm better, so-"

"You are mumbling, I can't understand you."

Simon waved his arms in aggravation, which actually triggered a spasm of pain.

"Well, I can't lock down the captain's quarters, so move over."

Simon gave Mal a resigned look.

"Consider yourself on forced bedrest." Mal slide along the side. When Simon attempted to lie on his side as well to accommodate more room, he found himself pushed back onto his back, a cold bag slipped under his head.

"That stays on ice. Get some sleep."

It wasn't cuddling, but Mal went to sleep with an arm around Simon, and Simon went to sleep wondering if Mal picked up the bossy 'this-is-for-your-own-good' tone from him.

Jaynisms~

"Hell, I'll kill a man in a fair fight. Or, if I think he's gonna start a fair fight."

Simon wonders if he should ask Jayne to spell pre-emptive strike, and then decides against it. Besides, he figures that since Jayne makes a living out of fighting, he should leave it to Jayne whether a person is going to start a 'fair fight' or not.

He wonders if the rules of a duel in the Core are considered the same as the ones on the Outer Rim.

He mentions this to Inara, who would know, and she smiles.

"Can you fence, Simon?"

"Yes. That was actually considered a core curriculum at my school. I never excelled, but I do know the rules and I did practice regularly, so when it showed up on the exam, I wasn't caught as flat footed as most of my other colleagues and didn't have to repeat it."

"Well then, have you ever seen Mal fence?"

Simon remembers back on Persephone, when Mal came back with slashed and stab wounds.

"I've seen the after math."

Inara smiles, and leans over the railing to watch the others play their crazy game. Simon turns back to his thoughts, wondering what Jayne would consider a fair fight.

Jayne once threatened to beat Wash with the chain of command, and at that point, Simon was glad he didn't fight Jayne. He simply followed his decisions as a doctor to best treat his patient.

Of course, getting Jayne back into the infirmary was a pain, even with the good Sheppard.

"Maybe I have the words wrong. Kaylee told me about it." Simon mutters. He tracks Jayne with a trained eye, searching for what makes a fair fight in the mercenary.

"See something you like?"

It's Mal. He just hollered up to Simon when he noticed that Simon was staring at Jayne, drawing everyone's attention to them.

"When you said you would kill a man in a fair fight, what would the rules be?" Simon called down to Jayne.

Well, and they thought River was full of surprises.

"Mal told me if he ever killed me, I'd be awake, facing him, and armed. What are your rules?" Well, in for a penny, in for a pound, and revenge is best if served cold.

Inara's sharp look at the captain isn't missed by Mal.

Zoe called back up, "The reason for your line of thought?"

Simon leans on the railing.

"Well, in the Core, there are actual detailed rules of combat. I was wondering if they applied out here as well."

"You looking to start a fight?" Jayne calls up.

"You know which end of a sword to hold?" Simon calls back down.

Zoe's lip twitches.

"What was that?" Jayne demands. Then he cottons on to which line Simon swiped from the second in command.

"Gorram hell, I'm a better fencer than Mal, I know my way around a knife."

"Yes, but I know my way around a scalpel and a sword." The others sidled to the side.

"Sir."

"No, let them bicker this out."

"I was asking in details of popcorn."

"None for me. I want to see this."

"Well, for starts, you have to be looking for a fight with me, and wanting to fight me. Those are my rules of combat." Jayne shot up to the doctor.

"So you can't cry foul if he kicks sand in your face?"

"That is a gorram tradition of fighting!" Jayne yelps.

"Yes, watching Jayne extol the virtues of under handed fighting to the doctor will certainly help their relationship." Zoe murmured.

"So I take it my answer is 'no'." Simon leans back from the railing. "Thank you for the insight, Jayne." He calls over his shoulder.

Then he walks away.

Jayne comes over, shaking his head.

"Anyone know what the ruttin' hell just happened?"

Snark~

"Well, that was a snarky attitude. Even Badger treats us better." Mal complained. Simon perked up. He hadn't heard anyone use a snide remark in months, unless it was Jayne's version, which was more cutting than edgewise and smart.

Instead, what comes out of his mouth was, "I wonder how long he had to hunt for it."

Shaking his head at Simon's snark, Mal went on to the kitchen for food.

Simon wondered if anyone had ever read Lewis Carol on Serenity. Book might have.

Flying Dogs~

"I've heard of 'when pigs fly' but I've never seen a dog fly." Mal explained with a grin.

"Well, that's strange, because I've certainly seen a horsefly." Simon counters.

"Well, there was that one gang that called themselves Flying Dogs back on White Fall." Jayne butted in.

"I wonder if 'Flying Aces' wasn't original enough." Simon quipped back.

"Dear, what is going on in here?" Zoe asked.

Wash perked up.

"Some sort of verbal sparring. Seems to be the put down of oxymorons."

"I ain't oxy." Jayne threw out.

"That leaves you as a moron and Captain as the foxy moron."

"Okay, what does that last one mean?"

"Cunning, yet you can't pull something off without planning beforehand. I think River and I are the most spontaneous thing you've ever done."

Simon settles against his chair and braces himself. The game just went from friendly dogs to really bitchy in zero point three seconds.

Then Mal is leaning across the gap and into his face, and here comes the lecture that will make him feel awful-

Soft.

Simon blinks, his face neutral and set in stone.

"That is the most spontaneous thing I've ever done." And then Mal is out of the room with his Captain dignity and Simon is left with a cold face that doesn't acknowledge anything as he gets up and leaves.

Jayne watches them leave out the separate doors.

"Think the doctor's snapped?"

"Well, I think somewhere there's a pack of dogs taking flight." Wash intones.

Boots~

Simon is cutting the boots off of Zoe's foot, salvaging what he can of her skin. He applies numbing cream and makes sure that she still use the foot, but right now she's the last one of a very long line of planet-only disease.

He knew he should have prepared more of the ointment. Their feet were so swollen from being down here the first time that the double crossers were planning on that to be the key part of the double crossing.

Once he's certain they will live through the night with their feet still attached, Simon leaves Wash to massage his wife's feet. Inara has taken over Mal's feet, and Simon heads towards Jayne.

"You really don't need to-"

"I'm not going to kiss it better, Jayne. Your feet need the circulation, or would you rather be known as Jayne 'Stumpy' Cobb?" Simon clips softly across his protest.

As he promised, no harm will come to them while they are under his care. Massaging was still considered a luxury, and no one cared that there were more health benefits than a few days of no pain.

Simon had grumbled within earshot of his professor that stretching each day had similar benefits. Now he understood the difference between flexing muscle and having it really sink into the layers of muscle to relax.

Kaylee came in with the steaming tubs of water to submerge the feet in. Shaking his head, Simon indicated where she should put them for now. He doesn't need them going into shock.

It's a long night, but in the morning Simon deems them ready to move out of intensive care. "Which means that you are staying off of your feet." Simon finalizes.

"What is on your feet?" Mal asks.

"Slippers. In case my feet start expanding, I still need to be able to take care of you. Inara's found some for herself and Kaylee, and River's just going barefoot."

Wash sighs, and compares his boots to his feet. There's a half-inch of swollen feet on either side of the boot's rubber sole.

Haircut~

Simon rarely bothers with his hair. But he needs it out of his face when he works, so he trims it back a few centimeters and deems it good enough.

He sits down in the mess hall and notices that his colleagues are shooting him covert glances. Some girls not sitting at their table are openly staring.

"Did I botch up the job or forget something?" Simon asks lowly to his hall mates. They look up from their food and glance at him, before one of them visibly jerks back.

"Dude!"

"Like, I know."

"Man."

Simon gives them his Patient Look TM.

"You, you cut your hair."

"And apparently I need to shell out some credits to get it fixed." He snaps back at them.

"Dude! No, we're in awe."

Simon rolls his eyes and nails them with his gaze.

"I know when I'm being mocked, guys. I'm not all that handsome."

"I think your hair is still wet."

The entire table turns to see the end seat. The young man shrugs. "Well, you're just far more attractive now that your hair is mostly combed back without the gelled look. Expect several propositions from idiots today."

In the present day, Simon cuts his hair listening to the hum of Serenity's engines. River had come in, demanding that he even up her hair ends. Well, not pushy, but he understood that she wanted her hair trimmed from the ramblings, and so had stood her and combed her and found her part on her head her hair followed.

Then he dampened her hair to flatten it and combed it out again. Finally, he snips along her hair, biting the comb so he can hold the hair between two fingers and even her hair.

She leaves with a bounce in her step, hair trimmings still clinging to her shirt.

Simon combs his hair and cuts it, using the mirror as his guide.

He sees the movement before he registers the person.

"I guess from the racket she's setting up that you'll soon have customers all wanting a haircut." Mal forewarns him.

Simon nods, and brushes his hair back in a careless movement. Mal hesitates for a moment, and then he's gone.

Wrestling~

Simon watches from the side lines, from under the shop awning. Mal is out there, in the rain, slugging away against two other men.

The mud is churning under their feet, and Simon wonders what he ever did for the Captain to come charging out of the bar.

The men had hit on River, and were bombarding her with so many thoughts that she actually whimpered in protest. So Simon cut in.

He told them to leave her alone, and pushed River towards Jayne, who grumped to a night lady that 'babysitting takes precedence' and sent her on her way.

Somehow, all the dancing girls had left in the next twenty seconds. Simon felt the sinking feeling that he had bit of more than he could chew, but he wasn't about to stand down.

They had dragged him outside. Jayne and Zoe had stood up, only to stand down at gunpoint from the rest of the gang that the town knew about.

Simon has the vague impression that Jayne and Zoe were having a right brawl with River inside while Mal fights off the other two.

Simon stands there, assessing the damage, his mind a million miles away as he wonders what supplies will be used up after this fight.

River is usually fine, Inara stayed with Serenity as a guard to Kaylee, and they had gone out job hunting. Hopefully, Jayne and Zoe can handle themselves, but Mal is on a two to one fight, and he told Simon to stay out of it.

Simon vaguely wonders where Mal had come from.

So he watches Mal wrestle with his problems and stands there, wondering what to do. Then he sees a man off to the side raise a gun.

His hand goes done and he finds a rock among the mud, and then it's zinging over the ground and cracks the gun man so hard he hears the collision over the rain.

It's the interruption Mal needs to put one down and take out the other.

Then Zoe and River are behind him with Jayne covering their retreat. Mal gets over to them and says something about a job next planet, and their gone.

Simon wrestles Mal down to the clinic with nips and jabs until he goes down on the table and let's Simon be a doctor. Lets him do something that he knows how to do.

Monster~

People think that it's the Reavers who are monsters out here on the Rim.

But Simon privately disagrees.

People who cut open your sister's brain, and play with her, and weaponize her-

Those are the real monsters.

They chose not to care.

Viagra~

"Did you know that cut flowers last longer if given Viagra?"

Rivers sudden statement had the entire crew freezing over dinner.

"That's not a euphemism, that's a scientific fact." Simon cuts in, giving Jayne a look across the table. The mercenary shut his mouth and leaned back. Simon only said that he wouldn't hurt him on the operating table.

Inara was nodding. "We sometimes use leftover supplies to spruce up the decorations for longer in the guild. That way, we were saving and recycling."

Simon nods. Every guild had their tips to save on the small stuff.

Mal rolls his eyes. "Well, I am quite certain that we don't have any Viagra on my ship, so find something else to keep your flowers fresh."

…..

9,635 words, 27 pages, and written and edited within 24 hours start to finish. And I thought I had writer's block. Maybe I just need inspiration.

Also, I can't figure out if my tenses are confusing, so after editing a second time, I am posting this two days late. Drop a review if you find a problem, please.