Pairings: slight Kaylee/Simon, any of a half dozen others if you're willing to squint really hard.
Warnings: Character death. Lots and lots of character death.
Disclaimer: Words are mine, world ain't.

a/n: C&C are always welcome!

Finding Serenity

Funny, but he never thought he'd be the last one left. Always figured he'd go out in a blaze of glory and bullets, take some other sonofabitch down with him. Never expected to live on this long, come to the end of his days an old man.

Now she's come, little miss Washburne all grown up, to tell him her mama Zoë's dead. And that makes him the last of the old crew.

First, course, there was the preacher, lost to the Alliance, and Wash, to the gorram reavers. And then it was 'Nara, wasting away from some damn disease till there wasn't nothin' left of her but a pretty shell. He 'members the shock on Kaylee's face the day the training house sent 'em that wave, the way Mal had shut himself away for longer than a captain had a right to. Missed her his own self, even if he hadn't gone around blubbering over it. Always seemed like long as she was around, they were more than just a pack of bandits. He liked bein' more, from time to time.

They'd had some good years after that though, he admits. Years where things had gone way they were supposed to as often as not, and everyone mostly managed to get along without taking knives or fists to each other.

But then that rendezvous had gone bad, real bad. Thought it was his time to die then, 'fore crazy girl came charging in, saved his ass right before he blacked out.

She couldn't save the Captain though. When he came to again, there the two of them were, lyin' back to back in their own blood. Died tryin' to save each other, like the damn fools they were.

He knew it was time to be gettin' the hell out of there after that. Ain't no kind of relationship worth the kind of pain people on that boat went through then, and the day he couldn't take the hollow look in Kaylee's eyes no more, couldn't stand to see the doc sittin' around with his head in his hands, he took off and never looked back.

Well, that weren't rightly true. Every couple years Zoë would track him down, fly in with Serenity and they'd go off to visit Kaylee and the doc planetside, where they'd carved out a sort of home for themselves. Doc couldn't take livin' on the ship no more without River, Zoë said. And Kaylee couldn't take livin' without him, so the pair of them went off together.

It was a nice enough little house they'd got. For a week or two he'd even enjoy playin' uncle Jayne to their passel of brats, giving 'em some brawling tips, teaching Zoë's girl to shoot with Mal's antique pistol.

But it always reminded him of everything they'd lost, and time came when he stopped going so often. Hadn't seen any of them in years when word came the doc was gone, taken off by the same gorram sickness he'd been goin' round tryin' to treat.

They'd all been gettin' on in years a bit by then, but it was still a shock to hear Kaylee'd died not two winters after. She was the youngest of 'em left, should've had plenty more years left to her, but without the doc – well, she'd never been the same, her kids said.

And now Zoë's gone too, died an old lady in her bunk on Serenity. How she's managed to keep her flyin' all these years, he never did know, but they just went on together, two old girls growin' older. Her daughter'll keep the ship flying, and that's more than can be said 'bout him at least.

It's a funny thing – he's been part of plenty of other crews since then, flown on more ships than he can count. Had a good enough life; hell, he even managed to find a woman he could stick with for more'n a year once. And he's got himself a cozy enough place here, though he spends most days in the bar, drinkin' and telling stories, the way a man's life oughta be. But for all the life that's gone on in between, it's still Serenity as comes to him in dreams, stories of all the shit that went down on her he tells most often.

Thinkin' on Zoë, he remembers how she used to say you never really left Serenity, just learned to live there. She might've been talking 'bout a different place, but damned if it still weren't the truth.

Now he just feels old, so ruttin' worn out that every old bullet wound gives him a twinge, every scar and joint aches in the cold. And lately he's been coughin' something fierce, can't even properly smoke a damn cigar no more. Life's gotten too hard for an old merc like him.

So he sleeps, and breathes a little slower every hour, til finally there ain't nothing left in him.

He's sure he fell asleep in his own room, but when he opens his eyes, he's standin' under bright sunlight, watchin' Serenity's doors slide open for him.

"'Bout time you showed up, Jayne. We've been waitin' on you."

The bright light was bad enough, but bein' confronted with his long-dead Captain ain't something Jayne cares for one bit. But that's Mal standing there, sure as anything, with Zoë and Book behind him. He can see Kaylee tinkering with somethin' a ways back, smilin' up at the doc. Crazy's sitting up on the catwalk, swingin' her feet, and Inara's behind her, smiling down on him like some kind of angel from the stories his ma used to tell.

Wash's voice crackles over the com – Is he getting on or not? We've got a schedule to keep here, people!

"You coming, Jayne? Ain't got all day."

"Yeah, but..." He turns around, finding nothin' but a big old empty desert behind him. "What the hell are y'all doin' here?"

"Came to get you, of course. You're on my crew." Mal turns, heading up the ramp. "So get your ass on board already."

There's one last second where he remembers that this ain't right, that something's gone wrong here for certain. But then he shrugs, heads up the ramp to join them.

Ain't like there's any place he'd rather be.