"These sessions have proved extremely valuable, Jayne-man," River panted. "Yet, it occurs to me that a key component to the simulation is absent."
Jayne looked up the length of arm stemmin' from the tiny hand that was currently crushing his throat. The string of curses swirling in his mind came out as a pathetic and breathless grunt.
"Oh, apologies."
Jayne took the opportunity of the sudden release to push the crazy girl off his chest. Seein' as he was plum worn out by their tussle, he simply propped himself up on his elbows. "Gorram it, girl. What the hell you on about now?"
"As these hand-to-hand combat simulations are premeditated, both opponents initiate the simulation on the same schedule and have ample time to calculate maneuvers and outcomes. This is not the case with most combat situation," she explained. "I believe we must adjust the parameters of the simulation to approximate actual field conditions which, as you know from professional experience, often include opponent unpredictability."
Jayne shook his head slowly, wonderin' when it was the crazy-girl started making sense. "You sayin' our sparring matches are missing the element of surprise?"
"Yes, precisely," she confirmed as she plopped herself down on the matt next to him. "To best approximate actual field conditions, we should not limit our simulation exercises to a designated time and place."
"Ya sayin' we just launch into fightin' with each other wherever and whenever we want?"
She responded with one of those smiles that lit up the place. "Yes."
Jayne considered the consequences of openin' up their tussles to anytime, anyplace. Jayne knew that she was right, it would help them both keep on their toes better than these daily sparring workouts. Not that Jayne was complainin'. In fact, he'd grown to lookin' forward to their matches.
At first, he thought it would be all about teachin' the girl a few tricks of the trade, but even after their first workout a few weeks ago, he had been takin' down with a move he ain't never seen before. Sure, he'd walked away with his fair share of bumps and bruises since then but the girl could fight like a demon, well more like a baby-doll demon, but a demon none-the-less.
Since he kinda liked the thought of sneakin' up on the girl from the shadows, he reckoned it might be downright entertainin' to take their workouts outside the ring so to say. " Alright, Crazy. You're on but we gotta make sure no one gets hurt," Jayne clarified. "Mal would airlock us both if our tusslin' hurt any of the crew."
"Agreed," River leaned down on her elbow, propping her head on her hand to face him. "We should also mutually agree on a prompt that indicates one opponents desire to conclude the altercation. However, such desire should not be extrapolated by the other to be a sign of weakness or defeat."
Jayne was a bit surprised at how close the girl's face had gotten to his. He watched as a drop of sweat slid down her cheek. It traced a slow, seductive trail from her temple, down past her earlobe, to finally settle in the hollow of the space at the base of her neck. And since he was lookin' at her neck anyways, didn't seem a far reach to let his eye glance over the rise and fallin' of her chest, or how her waist dipped down like a valley, settled against the gentle slope of her hip.
"Jayne?"
"Oh, um, yeah," he grumbled. "Yeah, it's called tappin' out."
"Yes, I believe that is the appropriate colloquialism," she nodded. "However, I believe a verbal cue may be more appropriate than a tactile prompt due to highly physical and aggressive nature of our combat simulations. I propose something simple and easily understood. Would the word "stop" serve as an appropriate tap-out prompt?"
Jayne once again found himself scrambling to rejoin the conservation. This time he'd been just starin' at her lips at she was talkin' about 'physical' and 'aggressive'. The girl certainly had a way of makin' fightin' dirty sound real….well, dirty.
"Sure, sure," he recovered. "No hurtin' crew and say 'stop' to stop. Got it."
"Fine," she said. "I also believe a few more ground rules may be in order."
"Damn it, girl," he swore. "Getting' kinda complex, ain't it?"
"No, I don't believe so." Her brow furrowed a bit. "Perhaps these parameters are obvious, however, I would prefer to be thorough. No fighting out of a job, at least no fighting each other," she smirked. "No fighting when I'm am piloting and, in reference to the afore-mentioned rule about keeping the crew safe, no fighting when others are nearby, especially Captain Daddy. He does seem to be somewhat over-protective of my safety."
"No kidding," Jayne snorted. "Since you're being all thorough and all, don't ya' think it would be a good idea to leave weapons out of it?"
Jayne was shocked as the girl slanted her head toward him slightly, leanin' in real close. "Oh, Jayne," she purred. "No more knives, I promise." He felt her sigh against his lips. "Will you ever forgive me?"
His head swirled a bit havin' her lips so close. "I forgave ya' a long time ago, girl," he said, staring at the depths of brown of her wide eyes. "But I ain't so stupid as ta' forget."
"That's good." She rolled toward him, her shoulder brushin' against his arm. After a brief second, she slithered from her stomach to her knees to her feet, never breakin' eye contact. "I am a weapon, Jayne, you should never forget that. We commence our impromptu simulations tomorrow."
With that, she skipped up the stairs, disappearing into the depths of the ship. Jayne dropped his elbows out from under him, his head landin' on the matt with a dull thud. Between the exhaustion from their recent tussle, the heat from havin' the girl lying so close and talkin' 'bout herself as a weapon, Jayne could barely breathe.
"Ah, shit, what've I got myself into this time," he sighed to himself.