~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ BDM spoilers herein. Proceed with caution. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Between Falling and Landing by ShinyBug

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ So quiet. Quiet like leaves falling, with no ground to land on. There is motion, there is life, but it is so slight it makes no mark upon the face of things.

The leaf feels differently, though.

River ghosts onto the bridge, her bare feet louder than anything else on Serenity. It is night, because it must be night somewhere, and only a mouse stirs. And Zoe.

The co-pilot’s chair is empty, so River sits there, draws her feet up and rests her chin on her knees. She pushes her breathing down into her belly, making it as silent as possible, slow, regulated waves of oxygen that stir not a one of the hairs falling over her face. The black is black, but there are little pinpoints of light in the distance, tiny speckles. A world in a grain of sand.

Serenity is far out, far away, somewhere on the edge. There are no planets here, no moons, no dead. They are in a holding pattern. Waiting for the verse to roll over, wake up, on the right side of the bed this time. Might be here a while.

Controls blink steadily in front of her knees. No ships on the radar, vid screen is dark. Proximity sensors proclaim solitude, isolation. No one coming, no one going. One already gone.

It has never been so quiet inside River. She has remembered and experiences what silence tastes like, what hollow looks like, the smell of no-longer-here. Sometimes her interpretation is joy, until she sees Zoe, and knows.

The leaf feels differently.

And Zoe breathes, and makes no sound, stirs no hairs. Watches the black, the grains of sand, the extinct reptiles on the blinking panel. Does not watch River.

“Did you know?”

River knows these three rusty words are the most Zoe has found hidden under her tongue in some time. Since Serenity found her wings again. She knows the gravity that is Zoe, knows that no Reaver and no Alliance scientist ever posed so great a threat to her own life as Zoe does, in her silence and her falling. She knows the weight of reckoning.

Such a conundrum. Knowing, and not knowing. Recognizing an imminent ending, among so many possible futures, and so many ends. Living eternity in an hour, between falling and landing. One is saved, another dies, and who is to say which is the truth? Seeing a Reaver spike, seeing a mosaic in reverse, glass burst apart, ventricles and vessicles, blood and bile, naugahide and batting. Pieces of Serenity. Knowing Serenity would die, certain of it before she ever opened her eyes and set one cold, naked foot on her cargo bay floor, shrieking in terror because she knew, she knew. Serenity would die one day, that she might live. Feeling the weight of that close over her as Simon covered her with his arms.

One death is much like another, easy to get confused. One can be reborn, the other must be put back together using memories and solder and thread and paint. A man can live, and die, and live, as can a ship, but not in so many pieces of metal. The vessel is ever-changing.

River does not look at Zoe. Zoe does not want to hear about falling leaves, or grains of sand, or conundrums, or vessels. Zoe is a sleepwalker, only wanting to know if she sleeps or wakes.

“No,” River says, and Zoe breathes out, and it is audible. It is a wind rushing through Serenity, and River is pulled into its gravity, until she too is sleepwalking. Mother is not there to wake her.