Disclaimer: JK Rowling can't take the sky from Joss Whedon.

The opening quote is taken from No Power in the 'Verse.

A/N: If your a nerd like me who is familiar with the official Map of the 'Verse, I have made a few changes. First, I went through and gave every planet a scientific name that matches the real naming scheme today with lowercase letters for planets, capital letters for "protostars," and Roman numerals for moons, moving out from the centre. This gives me a much more intuitive sense of the layout of the system than the official names, and in-story, Harry is more familiar with these scientific names and will use them in parallel with the official ones.

Second, I made some changes to the fan timeline in The Verse in Numbers (which is based on the Map) because some of the terraforming dates didn't fit the pattern. Miranda (Blue Sun Jb) was terraformed in 2502, not 2433. Rubicon (White Sun g) was terraformed in 2255, not 2519. And New Canaan (Blue Sun c) was terraformed in 2435, not currently in progress.

Finally, in this story, I write "the Verse" without the apostrophe, because it looks better, and it doesn't refer to the whole universe, anyway.

I've written up a proper outline for this story since I wrote the Prologue because I learnt my lesson with the Arithmancer Series. That was a lot of fun, but it went on way too long. For this one, the outline was surprisingly short: only 26 chapters to wrap up the major plot threads, although it's very much subject to change.

Chapter 1

Leaving Burnet (Blue Sun b I)

2521

"Somehow, some way, we're bringing down the Alliance, once and for all. Any of you don't want to be party to what I got planned, you're welcome to get off at the next stop. But if you stay, you do what I say, no questions asked. I'm tired of running. It's time to turn around, stand our ground, and be counted."

New Canaan (Blue Sun c)

Simon Tam stepped off the deck of Serenity, leading his sister with his arm around her shoulders. For her part, River just stared at the ground without looking back. Simon almost didn't look back either. He'd given up on most of the crew. He only spared a look at Kaylee over his shoulder. He could see the pain on her face, but she wasn't moving. The woman was too loyal for her own good—not even to Mal, but to Serenity. Serenity was a good old girl, but she wasn't for him anymore. Or for River.

Their cargo floated down beside them, and Simon looked out to scan the horizon. Burnet had been decently built up, but just one planet over, New Canaan was truly a frontier world, full of dirt roads and wood-framed buildings—like a lot of planets he'd seen in his time with the crew. He'd never wanted to live on one, but by now, he had resigned himself. He was more worried about how River was taking it.

Behind him, the third crew member who was getting off was not so stoic.

"Zoe, be reasonable," Inara pleaded. "You don't want River being around Emma, but you don't mind taking her into an active war zone?"

Zoe looked out at the three of them standing on the ground as she held her daughter. She barely glanced at Inara. "Even if I wanted to, I don't see anyone getting off who I trust to take her," she said coldly. "At least if I have her with me, I can keep in control."

"Is that really how you're rationalising it?" Inara said. "Simon, will you back me up, here?"

Simon turned around and looked back. All of the crew were gathered at the top of the cargo ramp: Mal, Zoe and Emma, Jayne (somehow), Kaylee, and the two new ones, Bea and Iris. "What about Iris?" he asked, looking Zoe in the eyes. "She has the same triggers in her head that River does. More, probably, since I got River out before they were done with her. She only got lucky that Kalista didn't get a chance to use them on Burnet. No offence," he nodded to Iris.

Iris. An Operative rescued from the same facility that had tried to turn River into a weapon. She was more stable and looked a lot more normal than when they'd found her, but Simon had no doubt that she could kill them all just as easily as River could.

But Iris just shook her head. "I know what I am," she said. "I'm a weapon. That's what they made me, and now, I'm going to turn it back on them. I'm here to take down the Alliance. If Zoe wants me to stay away from Emma, that's her prerogative."

"Plus, now that we know what Kalista can do, we can be more careful of her," Bea added.

Zoe raised an eyebrow at Simon as if to say, Your move.

"You shouldn't have to live like that, Iris," Simon said. "River, tell her."

"It's my choice," River said absently. "I could get off with you if I wanted, but I want to stay with the ship."

Simon did a double take before he figured out that River was reading Iris's thoughts—though she was speaking for both of them; she'd just made the opposite choice. Iris remained stoic.

Inara came down the ramp beside him and River. She looked defeated. Simon looked over the remaining crew again. He didn't bother arguing with Kaylee any more. They'd already had their fight. When his eyes met hers, she just said, "I'm sorry, Simon."

"Yeah…Me too," he answered.

"Look," Mal spoke up. "I'd say we're parting on about as good a terms as we can under the circumstances. You got honest qualms 'bout what we're planning to do, Doctor, and I can respect that. That just ain't gonna fly on Serenity anymore. As long as we don't see you fighting for the other side, we aren't gonna have any trouble in the future. Hell, we might even come back for a visit if we get the chance. But for now, we got business to take care of. Till then, good luck to you."

Simon nodded to him, but didn't otherwise acknowledge him.

"Good luck to you too," Inara said. Mal didn't acknowledge her.

"River, do you have anything to say?" Simon said.

"He is coming," she hissed.

Mal, who was about to close the cargo bay door, stopped. Even now, he wasn't about to ignore a last-minute warning from River. "Who's coming?" he said.

"The ghost."

"Who?"

"The Lost Boy. Looking for a home that doesn't exist anymore."

"What are you talking about?" Mal said suspiciously, and Simon wanted to know the same thing. Was she talking about one of the crew?

River smiled and said in a creepy, sing-song voice, "We're off to see the wizard…"

"You know what she's talking about, Doc?" Mal asked.

"No, this is a new one, Captain," he said. "River, who's the wizard?"

River suddenly jolted and said, "What wizard?"

"What—The one you were just talking about!"

"I didn't say anything."

"But—" Simon sighed and shook his head, looking back up at Mal. "Sorry, I've got nothing."

"Ah. Well, then…" Mal pressed the button to close the ramp. "Good luck."

"You'll need it," River called after him.

A few minutes later, Simon, River, and Inara and their cargo were cleared away, and Serenity lifted off, flying off to God knew where. "Well, that's it, then," Simon said. Mal was off trying to take down the Alliance, using methods Simon couldn't condone, even if Mal himself didn't approve of Mericourt and blowing up space liners. He was sure to do something violent and terroristic sooner or later. His girlfriend, a good friend with a baby, and a scoundrel he inexplicably still liked were running along after him, probably straight into serious danger. Who thought it would come to this?

River looked sullen. She might have actually taken it the worst of them, since her getting kicked off the ship wasn't her fault. Or he supposed none of them had truly been kicked off. Simon just couldn't accept Mal's plans; Zoe didn't was to see River's face around her daughter, and Mal and Inara couldn't look each other in the eye after he learnt about Fiddler's Green.

River broke away from Simon and put her arm around Inara's shoulders. Inara started to sniffle. "It's okay, Inara," River said. "We'll see them again."

Inara turned to stare at her. "Did your visions tell you that?" she said hopefully.

"No. They didn't need to," River said. "It's what my heart tells me."

Simon's mouth dropped open a little. Sometimes, even after all these years, his meimei could still surprise him. He sighed softly. "Come on," he said. "Let's get out of public before we attract too much attention."

Their exile on New Canaan, despite the poverty of the planet, wasn't too bad. Inara's status as a companion helped them get housing, and Simon's status as a doctor helped them get enough money to pay for it, since pickings were slim in her line of work here. Once they got on their feet, they'd have to seriously think about travelling again, especially since Kalista was still after River, but for now, they could try to settle in and catch their breaths. Maybe Simon could even help some people properly here, he thought. At least as long as he didn't almost get burned as a witch again.

But fate was a fickle thing, and it soon became clear that they wouldn't be settling in for long as they thought.

Harry's ship touched down on New Canaan, and he could have kissed the ground when he stepped out, dust and all. It wasn't that he didn't like flying; quite the opposite. It was just that it had been damned hard to get onto Burnet and even harder to get off of it again, what with the Alliance soldiers crawling all over it. He thanked Merlin he hadn't been caught with the amount of discreet magic he'd had to do to grease the wheels to get out of that madhouse.

Worse, he had no idea if his targets had come here. He was making an educated guess based on their past movements and the fact that they'd had nearly as hard a time getting off of Burnet as he had, and there was a good chance they would have made a short hop to the next planet over to catch their breaths and regroup before moving on. Of course, even if they had been here, his targets were probably long gone by now. His only chance to find them was to hunt around and track down where Serenity had gone next—and then hope they bloody well sat still long enough for him to catch up with them.

He looked around after he stepped off the transport. It was a cargo freighter barely more respectable than the one he was looking for, but it was the only semi-legitimate way out of Burnet that didn't involve running the Alliance gauntlet. New Canaan was a dusty, dirty world, sparsely colonised with only two hundred thousand people or so on it. Like too many planets on the Rim, it looked more like the Old West of Earth-That-Was than the modern, futuristic landscape of the Core Worlds. To think that people were still living like this after four centuries was almost enough to make him want to go after the Alliance himself.

But he couldn't stop to contemplate the scenery for very long. He had to get to work. The first place Harry looked was the customs and orbital traffic control office. That was the easy part; there was only one spaceport on the planet. If Serenity had landed there, they would know. They could disguise their identities, but you couldn't disguise that fact that a Firefly Series 3 had landed at the port, and there weren't many of those still in service. And they might have come down in the port. They had on Burnet, which was a large part of the problem, from what he could gather.

If Serenity hadn't come down at the spaceport, his job would be much harder. With a population as sparse as New Canaan's, they could have easily landed in the wilderness and ridden a Mule into town. Then, he'd have to try to find someone who had seen them and talked to them and try to figure out where they were going from that, and there was every possibility they had hidden their plans or spread misinformation. It was what he would have done, and if Reynolds and Washburne were competent soldiers…well, to be honest, they should have been covering their tracks better already with the amount of heat coming down on them, but he was sure they were only going to get harder to track from now on.

The spaceport was only marginally successful.

"Sorry, sir," the young manager said. "There haven't been any Firefly Series 3's checking in here in the past three weeks."

"Are you sure about that?" Harry said.

"That's what the log says," he insisted.

"Of course it does, Mr. Lynn. But of course, records can always have errors in them." Can be faked, he meant. That was hardly a sure thing, but it paid to be thorough.

"I suppose so," Lynn said nervously. "But I assure you, Mr. Potter, we run a very tight operation here."

Not likely on a frontier planet like this, Harry thought, but he pursued a different line. "Easy there, son," he said in a laid-back sort of way. "I'm not with the feds. I'm just looking for some friends. It's hard because I'm not sure what name they're flying under, but I heard they came through here."

It was a calculated move, borne out of long years of experience in the Auror program, to draw Lynn out little by little. "Oh? Uh, these friends of yours," he said. "They wouldn't happen be wearing brown, would they?"

"They're good people," Harry said, pointedly not answering the question. "I'm worried they might be in a bit of trouble. They've got a kid with 'em, and I really want to see if I can do anything to help. Sparing no expense."

Lynn eyebrows rose, and he grimaced and muttered something under his breath in Chinese that Harry didn't catch. He got the message. "Look, Mr. Potter," he said, "if there's a ship not recorded in the log, its because they only touched down long enough to get supplies and took off again. Maybe two weeks ago."

Ah, he knew how to play this game. "Thank you. That's good to know. I don't suppose they said where they were going, did they?"

He shook his head forcefully. "No, definitely not."

"Right. You said they went for supplies. Do you have any idea where they might've gone for them."

Lynn didn't answer, but his eyes were evasive.

"I'm going to be looking for the place either way, son," Harry said. "Besides, I might want some supplies myself."

He sighed and wrote down the names of a few shops for him.

"Thanks. So, how much did they pay you to keep quiet about this?"

He named a number that was higher than Harry expected, but not exorbitant. Harry mentally counted his money and estimated how much he could spare. If New Canaan didn't pan out, he'd have to break off and take a few more jobs. He told him, "I'll match that for you to keep quiet about my asking for them. I want to avoid the feds at least as much as you do."

Lynn was happy to take that offer, and Harry went on his way. He wasn't a hundred percent certain Lynn had told the truth, but his instincts said yes, and his instincts, after all these years, were still good.

The other hard part about this kind of detective work, Harry reflected, was that people's memories tended to be especially poor concerning people who had only passed through briefly a few weeks ago and who were trying their best to look unremarkable. It was a problem he had faced in his Auror days, but worse because the Verse was a much bigger place. Plus, he had to be careful about using any magic to help things along.

He asked around several places on Manager Lynn's list, and he got nothing. At a couple of others, the shopkeepers claimed to recognise the faces of some of the Serenity crew in photos, but that was all. Manager Lynn's intel seemed to be good, though, because Harry finally got a lead from a shopkeeper whose name, oddly enough, was Mrs. Lin.

"Yes, he looks familiar, Mr. Potter," she said, pointing at a picture of Jayne Cobb. "He was a big man in a funny hat. I remember because it looked like something my grandson would wear. He's eight."

"Yes, that sounds like him, alright," Harry said with a smile. "Do you recognise any of the others?"

"Hmm…her, maybe," Mrs. Lin said, pointing at Zoe Washburne. "I'm not sure. Are they friends of yours?"

"We travel in some of the same circles," Harry said truthfully. "Did they say anything about where they were going?"

"No. They were pretty tight-lipped, as I recall. Or maybe they were between jobs and really didn't know."

"That's alright, ma'am. Would you happen to know anyone else they might have talked to while they were in town?"

"No. Folk learn not to ask too many questions in times like these." She lowered her voice. "Not with the Alliance knocking on our door. They didn't say anything, I doubt anyone would ask."

Harry gave her what he hoped was a winning smile. "That's okay, Mrs. Lin," he said. "Thanks anyway."

"I'm sorry I couldn't be of more help, Mr. Potter," she said. He was just about to go when she spoke up again: "I suppose if anyone knew something about your friends, it would be the new doctor in Shiloh."

He stopped cold, and his eyes widened a fraction. "New doctor?" he said.

"Yes. Didn't see him myself, but he came around about the same time as your friends. Might've even come with them, come to think of it. He was in town a few days helping our own doctor, and then he went over to Shiloh because they needed one."

Could I really be that lucky? he thought. Wo de ma, of course I could. I'm Harry Gorram Potter. My luck is always insane. "I think that's exactly who I need," he said. "Thank you, Mrs. Lin."

Harry left the shop a little more optimistic and headed to the train station to buy a ticket to Shiloh. He didn't know why the Tams would have stayed behind here, so close to where they were last seen, but it was more than worth a look. Now, he had to think about how to approach this. If the new doctor really was Simon Tam, he was sure to be skittish. And with his sister being a Reader—hell, she might already know he was coming. He didn't know how Reading worked or whether Occlumency worked against it. He would have to tread carefully if he was to get close enough for them to allow him to test River Tam for magic.

Simon tried to flash a cheerful smile as he drew blood from the boy's arm. The child's mother stood anxiously behind him with a bit too tight a grip on his shoulder. He had a bad feeling this was going to be one of the hard cases: either impossible to treat, or worse, impossible to diagnose. Symptoms like "generalised weakness" and "loss of appetite" were a physician's worst nightmare because they could be caused by nearly anything, and they didn't give you any other clues.

For cases like this kid, he was stuck making guesses based on lifestyle, environment, and family history. A father working an industrial job on a border planet was a big red flag, so he immediately went to a blood test that would rule out some of the worst options. It only took a minute. Reading the printout, he was relieved, but it did nothing to reduce his frustration.

He put his smile back on and turned back to the mother and child. "Well, the good news is, it's not Bowden's," he said, which was a relief to them, too. "I don't see any obvious infections, either. It could be immunological or maybe genetic. I'd like to run a gene sequence over the weekend to check for that. In the meantime, I can give him something for his appetite and see if that helps. Come back on Monday, and we'll take another look, okay?"

"Of course, Doctor," the mother said. "Thank you."

Simon quickly filled the prescription, started the gene sequence, and sent the pair on their way. He sighed when they were out of sight. Back on Osiris, he could have done the genetic screening on the spot and got a white cell culture back from the hospital by closing time. On New Canaan, it would take a week. But still, these people needed a doctor, and they hadn't had any problem with River so far, so he could at least feel like he was actually doing good for once.

Luckily, his last few cases of the day were pretty simple. An injury that needed five stitches and a tetanus shot, a case of stomach flu, a regular checkup for an old woman's various health problems, and so forth. It wasn't too busy a day today, and he closed up on time.

After making sure everything was secure, he left the clinic, closing the door behind him. He was about to lock it, but he stopped when he saw a man standing there in the corner of his eye and turned to him. "Unless it's an emergency, we're closing up for the night," he told him.

The man just stood there. "Doctor Simon Tam?" he asked in an accent that was once called British.

Simon froze and looked the man up and down in a heartbeat. He was older, probably in his fifties. Black hair with wisps of grey and bright, green eyes. The brown coat could be good or bad, depending on whether he was with the Peacemakers, or if it was a ruse by an Operative. "Who wants to know?" he answered slowly as he tried to reach for his gun while still acting casual.

The man held up his empty hands and said, "I don't have a gun, Dr. Tam. And I'm not with the feds. If I were, I think this meeting would be a lot noisier."

Simon went for his gun anyway, but he held it lazily by his side. The man didn't seem offended by that, at least. "Maybe it would," he said. "How can I be sure? What are you doing here?"

"Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Harry Potter."

Simon's memory twinged. The name sounded familiar. But no, he was pretty sure that was some obscure Earth-That-Was historical figure.

Potter continued, "As for what I'm doing here? I'll tell you the truth: I've been looking for a Reader, and your sister is the best lead I've found in the past seven years. I'd very much appreciate it if I could meet her."

Simon narrowed his eyes. That didn't sound like something the Alliance would come up with. Kalista might use a ruse, but it wouldn't be as unusual as this. A bounty hunter wasn't out of the question, though. "I'm afraid I don't know what you're talking about, Mr. Potter," he tried.

The man scoffed: "I think I'm a little better informed than that, Doctor."

"Oh? And what do you think you know?"

"Damn near everything you can get off the public cortex, and a bit more gleaned from government servers. I know they did something to River at the Academy—something that messed her up and made her a target. I assume that second thing had something to do with Miranda."

Simon snorted. Someone back there was dumb enough to put a psychic in the same room as a government official with classified knowledge. "You're not exactly earing my trust bringing that up, Mr. Potter," he said.

"I also know that River was a Reader before she went to the Academy," Potter continued. "And that she was a genius who was compared with Hermione Granger when she was still in primary school."

Simon inclined his chin and considered this man more closely. That was a comparison he hadn't heard in a long time—not since the Shepherd left the ship, for sure. That told him two things. One, Potter was very well read with River's files—not a generic Browncoat or Peacekeeper—and two and probably less important, even with his accent, his use of "primary school" rather than "grade school" narrowed down the list of places he could be from. He considered his next line of questioning. "Say you're telling the truth," he said. "What do you want with a Reader?"

"I'm looking for my family, Dr. Tam," Potter said, surprising him. "It's a long story, but the important thing is that they've vanished so thoroughly that I believe there has to be foul play involved. I've searched for years and haven't found them, and keep in mind, I found you, so that should give you some idea of my capabilities."

Simon was taken back to those sleepless nights he'd spent searching for River, being told he was paranoid to think there was anything wrong, even though he couldn't so much as figure out where the Academy was as he plunged ever-deeper into a web of government secrets. If this was a lie, it was carefully calculated to play on his sympathies, with information not many people would know. Of course, that only made him more suspicious.

"I'm not armed, Doctor," the man said. "You can search me if you want."

That was exactly what Simon did next. He approached Potter, being sure to keep his own body between him and his gun, and patted him down thoroughly. He didn't have a gun. In fact, he didn't have much on him at all: just a wallet and some kind of coin purse. Simon stepped back and regarded him again. "You really don't carry a gun?" he asked.

"I learnt to take care of myself without one," he answered.

"And so you want, what? Just to talk to my sister?"

He nodded. "If I'm lucky, a few minutes' conversation is all I need. If it's not, we can talk abuot it. I wouldn't and probably couldn't make either of you do something you didn't want."

Something didn't add up here, Simon thought. No gun, no pressure, and way too much information. Nobody acted like that out on the Rim. Potter wouldn't be on New Canaan without some kind of backup…And that meant it made more sense that he was the distraction.

With an effort, he forced himself to relax and holstered his gun. "I don't like people interfering with my sister, Mr. Potter," he said, "but if you aren't going to try anything, and you only need a few minutes, you can meet her."

He smiled easily. "Thanks, Dr. Tam."

"This way," Simon said. He moved quickly, putting a few steps between them, and raised a radio to his mouth, keeping one eye on the interloper. "Inara, can you come over to our apartment and help River get ready for dinner? We have a guest coming tonight," he said. He watched Potter as he put the radio down. He didn't seem to have noticed the code phrase.

He led Potter around the town in a roundabout path, the opposite way from how he would usually go home, making a three quarter circuit around the town. He glanced back at Potter every so often. Potter started frowning about halfway through. He didn't say anything, but he was probably on to him.

They were nearing home when Simon's radio crackled. "Inara?" he asked.

"Simon, River said she hadn't heard about any guests," Inara told him.

He stopped in mid-stride and glanced back at Potter. "None?" he said. Had River missed him somehow?

"I might have misinterpreted, but I think that's what she meant."

"Well…I've still got the one," he said.

"I'll be sure to make enough for him, then."

"Got it. We're almost there." Simon put the radio down, wondering when he had become this paranoid. True, a lot of these code phrases had been River's idea when they'd landed. Outwardly, he shrugged at Potter and kept going, this time heading straight home. Potter still looked perfectly laid-back, which wasn't an encouraging sign.

"So you two weren't the only ones to stay behind on New Canaan?" Potter asked.

Simon briefly considered denying it. Inara's prestige and ability to conceal her connections as a Companion were one of their greatest assets, but he'd find out soon enough. "A few of us decided to go our separate ways, yes," he said. Potter didn't press the subject, and a minute later, they were at his and River's apartment. "Inara?" he called as he opened the door, putting his hand back on his gun, just in case.

Inara was there in the living room. "Simon," she said cheerfully. "How was your day?"

"A little unusual," he said. "Inara, this is Harry Potter. Mr. Potter, Inara Serra."

"It's good to meet you, Mr. Potter," Inara greeted him.

"Pleasure," Potter said, shaking her hand with an oddly frosty manner. She furrowed her brow. Something was definitely off about him.

Simon pushed through it. "And my sister is…?" he raised an eyebrow at Inara.

"River, honey, could you come out here?" Inara called.

"I told you, there's no one coming—" they heard her call from her bedroom. Still, the door opened, and she came out, but River stopped in her tracks when she saw Potter. They both froze, staring intently at each other. Then, River screamed.

"AHHHHH! ZOMBIE!"