scribblinlenore | Firefly FIC: Scissors Can't Be Trusted

Title: Scissors Can't Be Trusted
Fandom: Firefly
Pairing: Mal/Simon
Rating: R
Summary: Simon protects his sister. Mal protects his crew.
Warning: Non-explicit non con (although not between Mal and Simon!)
Notes: Thanks to my dear

alizarin_nyc for looking this over for me and helping to calm my new fandom jitters.

Scissors Can't Be Trusted
by Lenore

Simon folds the shirt, carefully, creases like knives, adds it to the stack of clothes in the drawer, neatens the stack until the edges are perfectly straight, his hands like rulers. The bed is already made, and he bends to smooth out wrinkles that are largely imaginary, but the action is soothing. Order. Order is what he needs.

He starts in on the bedside table, and the knock at the door startles him enough that he drops the books he's arranging. Tidiness is not the most impervious of shields.

"Captain."

Mal doesn't wait for an invitation; he just strides into the room. Simon has learned to expect it. This is Mal's ship, and the captain takes that claim seriously.

"Thought I'd check in on you, doctor." His tone is casually polite, as if he's simply making conversation, but here is something else that Simon has learned. Mal wastes nothing, words least of all.

"Everything's fine," Simon says with a shrug, the faintest suggestion of and I don't know why you're asking me.

"Is that right?" Mal's eyes narrow, the politeness suddenly gone. "Then help me understand why you been holed up in here all day when I ordered you to get off this boat and go have some fun. There's a town out there just brimmin' with geegaws and other fine things to put a hole in your pocket, not a fed in sight, and another day yet to enjoy some shore leave."

"We went sightseeing yesterday," Simon says stiffly. "There's only so much interest that backwater geegaws hold."

"Uh huh," Mal says, in a tone that implies that Simon can stop treating him like an idiot any time now. "Then tell me this, doctor. Have you gone deaf all of a sudden? 'Cause little sis seems a mite more restive than usual today. Seen the preacher tendin' to her, and Inara, little Kaylee too, but I ain't seen you budge from this room, not once."

A picture of River flashes through Simon's head, the way she looked yesterday, sorrow and rage etched so deeply into her young face that Simon hopes never to see it again. He pushes the picture away. He can't afford to dwell on it, not when he has responsibilities to take care of.

"Of course, captain. I'm sorry. I'll see to her at once."

He starts for the door, but Mal doesn't move out of the way. "Why don't you try tellin' me what went on instead?"

Simon is sweating beneath his collar. Guilt and dread collide in his stomach. He's been on Serenity long enough to know that this information should have been offered up at the first opportunity, and yet, just imagining himself saying the words to Mal makes him taste vomit.

He stares down at his shoes, at their dulled shine, and starts to talk.

The sky was high and bright yesterday, only a few gauzy clouds. The town looked cool and white in the distance, nestled in a green valley, just over a slight rise from where ships docked. No Alliance, but more than the usual degree of civilization to be found on an outer rim planet. Clapboard houses stood in neat blocks. There were rows of shops along refreshingly mud-free streets. He and River strolled the sidewalk, browsing the merchandise in store windows.

River let out a squeak of excitement at the sight of a toy store and made a beeline for it, putting her hands, freshly sticky from a stop at the confectioner's, all over the glass, staring starry-eyed at the dollhouse on display. "The tea cups were too tiny when the girl was thirsty, but she loved it when the doorbell chimed and the clocks ticked. Such a happy home."

Simon smiled. "I remember, mei-mei.."

River's dollhouse had been her pride when she was little, a three-storied monstrosity, fitted out with tiny furnishings and tapestry rugs, even a tea service that was an exact replica of the one handed down in their mother's family.

The memory of happier times caught them both up, and they pressed close to the toy store window. Simon really should have known better than to let himself get distracted, by nostalgia of all things. Iron hands closed on him before he knew what was happening, wrenching his arms behind his back, jerking a hood over his head. River made a muffled noise of distress that told Simon she was getting the same treatment.

A gun jabbed at Simon's ribs. "Best not to kick up a fuss. Got a nervous trigger finger."

They were hustled along, and when the hoods came off, they found themselves in the sheriff's office. It was a far cry from the fed base in Ariel City, no scanners, no high tech security systems, just a simple room, just the sheriff and the two men who'd grabbed them. Simon looked around, instinctively memorizing the layout, calculating the distance to each exit, searching for something that could work in their favor. He might have been disturbed by how much Mal and his gang had rubbed off on him if it weren't the only hope they had.

River huddled next to him on the hard bench, her fingers curled around the edge of it, knuckles white with the strain of holding on. Occasionally, she darted panicky looks at Simon, can't go back, can't go back, as clear as any words.

The sheriff just sat there for the longest time, reared back in his chair, enjoying the sadism of silence. At last, he waved a copy of the wanted notice in the air, exchanging a congratulatory smile with one of his deputies. "Looky what we got here, Fess. Simon and River Tam, two of the Alliance's most wanted. Worth a good chunk of coin, from what I read."

Simon's heart raced so hard it made him feel sick, but he managed to keep the desperation out of his voice, "More likely turning us in will buy you a certain death, in screaming agony. That's how the last officers of the law were rewarded for their cooperation." He met the sheriff's eye and held it, with a bravado that he hoped looked more convincing than it felt. "There's so much more going on here than you know, and it's all dangerous. Not just to River and me."

The sheriff seemed to hesitate, and Simon thought he saw a spark of fear there. People on this planet sympathized with the Independents, Mal had said, weren't much for dealing with the Alliance.

Simon pressed the advantage, "We can pay you."

The sheriff smiled. His fear, if it had ever been anything more than a figment of Simon's hopeful imagination, was gone now. "Oh, we've done got your money. I reckon if you want to walk on out of here you're gonna have to make us a better deal than that. Surely you got something else worth tradin' for your freedom."

He ambled over and stopped in front of River. His mouth crooked into a lewd grin as he reached out to finger a strand of her hair.

River shrank back. "They dig into you, and they think they know, but they're still just as blind."

"She's a colorful one, ain't she?" The sheriff leered. "I like 'em with some fire."

Simon threw himself in front of River, as best he could with one wrist cuffed to the bench. "Don't you touch her!"

The sheriff gave Simon a speculative look that made his skin crawl. "That's all right then. We ain't none too picky where we get our thrust. You'll do as good as your sister." He stroked his fingers against Simon's cheek, ancient grime under his nails, the smell of iron and grease on his skin. "I reckon you're near as pretty."

Simon stared at him. "You can't be serious."

The sheriff shrugged. "Or we could go on and turn you over to the feds. Don't make no nevermind to me. I'm gonna get somethin' out of it one way or the other."

The other men stood there grinning. One of them rubbed at his crotch in crude anticipation. Behind Simon's eyes swam the image of the scan he'd taken of River's brain, white striations where they'd cut over and over, taking away a little bit more of his sister every time.

"I'll take the deal."

River started to shake her head frantically. "Hanging by a thread, and the blade is sharp, so the thread fears it." She grabbed fistfuls of Simon's vest. "Scissors can't be trusted."

"River, River, listen to me." Simon stroked her hair, trying to calm her. "It's okay. Everything's going to be okay." He looked over her head at the sheriff. "Someplace private. My sister doesn't see anything."

"Can't nobody ever say we're not civilized around here." The sheriff nodded to a deputy to unlock Simon's cuffs. Then he put two fingers in his mouth and let out a loud whistle. "Emmabeth!"

A frowsy looking woman poked her head into the office. "What you want, Earl?"

The sheriff nodded to River. "Got some business to take care of, and there's a young lady here what could use a bit of lookin' after. Don't want nobody givin' her no trouble."

Emmabeth laughed and plopped down onto the bench next to River. "Well, you are a pretty little thing. I can see why the fellas would want to get right friendly like, but don't you worry none, honey. I'll keep the jackals off ya."

"Who's going to keep the jackals off Simon?" River asked plaintively.

The sheriff and his men laughed.

"You leave that to us, little sister." The sheriff took Simon by the arm, fingers digging in, squeezing bone. "We're gonna take good care of your brother. You can count on that."

They hustled Simon back to the cells, to a room at the end of the long corridor that apparently served as solitary confinement. It was tiny, cold concrete and stone, with manacles attached to a metal ring gouged deep into the wall. They shoved Simon inside, and all three men streamed in after him, one of them already unbuttoning his pants. The door slammed shut with a bone-rattling clang.

Simon stops talking.

Long beats of silence go by before the questioning starts, each word quiet and deadly serious, "How many were there?"

Simon shakes his head. "It doesn't--"

"Best you let me decide what's important and what's not here on my own boat, doctor. You and little sis getting hauled in by the sheriff is something I should have been hearing first thing you got back. Now there's folk out there that maybe can place you on Serenity, folk that just might be gettin' all cozy like with the feds while you're standin' here not answerin' me."

"I was careful!" Simon insists, although guiltily. "No one followed us."

"You sure about that?" Mal crosses his arms over his chest, and Simon doesn't answer. "Now, let's try this again. How many were there?"

"Three." Simon stares down at his shoes again. It's easier that way.

"Describe 'em."

Dirty, grabby, obscene. Simon does his best to be more specific.

"They hurt you?"

Simon shakes his head. Maybe they wanted to humiliate him some. Mostly, they just wanted to fuck.

"They do anything to your little sis?"

Simon's face turns hot with indignation. "I'd never let that happen to her!"

The captain studies him. "No, I don't 'spose you would."

Mal turns to go, and Simon has been wishing for nothing else since this conversation began, so there's no explaining why he doesn't just keep his mouth shut.

"Are you going to start calling me a whore now too?" It spills out, bitterly.

Mal takes a moment before he answers. "Not much call for that word where there's force been used." The look he gives Simon has nothing like disdain or judgment in it.

Ironically enough, his sympathy might be worse.

Simon lifts his chin defiantly. "I made a deal. I wasn't raped."

Mal's expression shutters closed. "I expect you'd know best about it."

He goes, his boots echoing on the metal corridor, his voice ringing out, "Wash!"

Simon bends down to retrieve the books he dropped from the floor and arranges and rearranges them on the nightstand until they feel clean enough. Then he goes to find River.

This proves easier said than done. He searches all over the ship without a sign of her. Any other time, he'd be frantic, afraid that River was missing, that she'd been taken, but now he feels certain she's simply hiding from him. For all that he's been studying her for months, he still doesn't understand what those animals at the academy did, how they changed her, what she might have seen, behind a locked door from another room.

He's distracted enough that it takes him the better part of an hour to realize that the ship isn't powering up, isn't going anywhere. As if to emphasize this point, Wash comes wandering into the cargo hold while Simon is checking the secret compartments, the ones he knows about at least, for his wayward sister.

"Do you know where the captain is?" Simon asks, doing his best to sound casual.

Wash shrugs. "He said something about business to take care of. Zoe and Jayne went with him. All I know is that I'm supposed to have Serenity in the air the second their boots hit the gangway."

He heads off whistling, and Simon is left there thinking, No, that can't be right. The captain never shies away from a fight, but he doesn't go charging into one unnecessarily, either. Simon forgets all about his search for River. He climbs the stairs to the catwalk where he has the best view out the cargo bay door. He waits and watches and waits some more, and still the captain, Zoe and Jayne don't appear.

River joins him after a while, willing to be found now that he's stopped looking for her. "For every action, there is an equal but opposite reaction. Only sometimes the laws of physics don't apply. That's what we call overkill." And then more lucidly, "He's going to be fine, you know."

Simon's hands are clenched so hard around the railing his palms are going to smell like metal for days. "I hope you're right, mei-mei."

He feels like he's waited forever when he finally spots them, a trio of dark shapes breaking the horizon, silhouetted in the blare of late afternoon sun. Simon hurries down the stairs to meet them, and when they stride through the door, he can see no blood, no obvious injuries.

"What did you--"

"I reckon those hwun dan won't be making no more deals with folk." Mal strides over to the comm, hits the button. "Wash, take us out of the world." His tone is all business, and then he's up the stairs, purposeful as ever, off to see to his ship.

Zoe pats Simon on the shoulder as she passes. Even Jayne doesn't look particularly resentful that's he had to go clean up one of Simon's messes. He heads off to his bunk, his gun crooked nonchalantly in his hand.

Simon makes himself scarce the next few days, hiding out in the infirmary, taking meals back to his room. Mal countenances it until he doesn't, and then he tracks Simon down for the express purpose of scowling at him. The next time they sit down to dinner together, Simon is there. The last to arrive, and he slinks over to his chair, feeling awkward.

For a moment no one says anything, meaningful looks traveling around the table.

Then Zoe nods. "Doctor."

River bumps shoulders with him, a sisterly gesture of glad you're here.

Kaylee passes him the rolls, smiling extra kindly.

The shepherd picks up the story he'd been telling when Simon appeared, something about a nature retreat and one of his fellow brother's inability to tell edible mushrooms from the psychedelic variety. By the time the dishes are cleared, Jayne has managed to call Simon pompous not once, but twice, and Simon has glared a reminder, who has syringes full of paralyzing agents? Mal looks on as if all is right with the 'verse.

Simon is startled by the realization that this, here, now, is all the captain truly wants, everyone at their place around the table, and no one trying to kill them for five minutes. The simplicity of the ambition feels strangely moving, and the more Simon thinks about it afterwards the guiltier he feels that he ever endangered it with his silence.

The next time he finds Mal in the galley alone, he gets a cup of coffee and joins him at the table. "I wanted to say I'm sorry. I should never have let-- nothing should get in the way of doing what's best for the people on this ship. It won't happen again."

"Didn't expect it would." Mal gives him a look over the top of his mug. "And when I think you owe me an apology, doctor, you'll surely know it.

"But you and Zoe and Jayne had to," he swallows hard, "so they wouldn't contact the Alliance. You could have been--"

Simon stops, because there's an impatient look in Mal's eyes, like it's already settled between them. Why are we still talking about this? Only nothing is so easily settled with Mal when the safety of his crew is at stake. And then Simon knows. The captain was never really concerned about the feds.

"You didn't have to," Simon says softly.

"Best you not go telling me how to run things on my own boat." Mal's stern face is belied by the gentleness of his tone. "I've got captainly things that need seeing to."

He gets up, rinses his cup in the sink.

"Thank you." Simon doesn't turn around to look at him. It's easier that way.

Mal settles a hand on his shoulder, so briefly Simon could almost have imagined it. "I told you. You're on my crew."

His footsteps travel away, and Simon sits there waiting for some refracted guilt to hit him. A flaw in the math, as River might say, three lives for his-- what? Honor? The old him would have been appalled. But he sits and he waits, and nothing like regret comes. There's just the picture of an empty room with its rough walls, and no one to remember what happened there but him.

He washes his mug and heads off to the infirmary. He's on the crew. He has doctorly things to attend to.

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Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

luvmax1.livejournal.com

I'm glad you've turned your talents to Firefly, Lenore. This was a great fic, I loved how you demonstrated Simon's complete devotion to River, and Mal's same devotion to his crew. Really great job!

From:

Not a homecoming queen

Firefly FIC: Scissors Can't Be Trusted

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