Sarie is weeping; a boy she likes has told her he's too good to take out a "space gypsy," and the rest of the crew is arguing about what manner of pain to visit upon him and who gets to do the honors. Kaylee is not part of the fight. She finds her little girl huddled in the engine room, muffling her sobs in a ragged sleeve, beneath the bulkhead she slept on as a baby, so Kaylee could keep an eye on both her girls.

She is still so small, her baby girl. Not that anyone's tall nowadays, whether from malnutrition or just the low height of ceilings and ship's corridors. But Sarie is smaller than most, and more fragile in looks. Kaylee sits next to her and wraps an arm around her daughter's thin shoulders.

Sarie transfers her pain from Serenity to her mother's shoulder in a leap, and sobs wordlessly for what seems like forever. Kaylee doesn't have any words for this first heartbreak, though she's hurting too, for her baby. She doesn't think there are any words, or none that wouldn't trivialize pain, at any rate. So all she does is stroke her daughter's hair, and wait.

It could have been worse, she supposes, though the rest of the crew doesn't seem to think so. The boy could have told her she was beautiful, lead her on and left her sobbing harder, though in that case Kaylee doubts there would be enough left of him to bury. The boy could have reached from an alley, wrapped an arm around Sarie's waist and asked in a deep, caressing voice if she'd ever been raped.

Though Sarie is strong, stronger in some ways than her mother is. Perhaps that kind of psychological torture would not have affected her, though Kaylee still wakes up sometimes sweating, and has to turn and bury her face in Simon's shoulder and shake herself to calmness before she can sleep again. Perhaps her sweet, silly daughter would simply have applied her lessons in armed and unarmed combat. Kaylee wonders if she should remind her crewmates that their fragile little girl with a sweet smile and deadly abilities deserves to be the one delivering the pain, if she wants to.

The rush of tears has slowed to a trickle, now, and Sarie seems to be done crying. She pushes away from her mother's shoulder, wipes her cheeks. She smiles, a little watery, but still a smile, and says thank you when Kaylee offers a handkerchief. She'll be all right.

It's Sarie's first experience with heartbreak, though it assuredly will not be the last. But Kaylee's daughter is made of thin, invisible steel, like the ship she was raised on. Sarie will bend, but Sarie will not break. After all, she is a daughter of Serenity. In more ways than one.

Kaylee hugs her little girl, and pats the bulkhead of her big girl. They'll be all right, Kaylee and her girls. No matter what happens, they'll be all right.