Weapon

Summary- no one knew weapons better than Jayne. And hell, that girl wasn't nuttin' more than a weapon, wasn't she?

Jayne eyeballed the girl from across the cargo bay. She was sitting on the catwalk, feet hangin free as she followed the toss of the ball back and forth. The rest of the crew was all playing, makin fun of each other for missin shots and the like. He snorted from his weight bench. They'd asked him to play but he'd said no- he had sumthing that needed thinking on, and he did his best thinking whilst liftin.

A grunt escaped his lips as he hefted the barbell and returned to his prior topic of thought- the girl. Funny little moonbrain, watching the ball like she knew where it was going and all. And her feet swingin front and back was a bit distracting.

The girl'd been getting better about bein' crazy, since the shit with Miranda had hit the fan. To his mind it seemed liked she'd used most a her crazy on killing a room fulla Reavers. That had been mighty impressive, seeing her standing there, all crazy-like, covered in gallons of blood. He'd bet then, and been proved right at the Alliance hospital, that none of it had been hers. Mighty impressive, the merc thought.

Girl was still bat shit crazy though. Broke inside, like. Head wasn't sittin too squarely on them pretty small little shoulders of hers. He scowled at that thought- ain't that I think she's pretty, he reminded himself. Just that she's pretty small. He grunted in frustration and sat up, adding more weight to the bar. So. The girl was broke, and crazy, and impressive. Well sure she was, what with them Academy types messing with her brainpan and amygly-somesuch for however long. Jayne figured she deserved to be at least a bit messed up from all that go se. As long as she aint taking that craziness a hers out on any of his crew. Them's that was as close to a family as he'd got out in the black- and as close to family as she'd got either.

Those that spawned her didn't deserve to keep her. Just handing their daughter over to arseholes like the gorram monsters that ruined her- his blood was boiling just thinkin about it. At least she got that pansy-ass brother of hers. Wasn't entirely without relation.

He finally put down the weights as the game wound to a close. From the exultant looks on Mal and Kaylee's faces, and the way they were making fun of the other team, they'd beaten Simon and Wash real soundly.

Jayne chuckled and wiped sweat off his forehead. He was kinda glad he hadn't been on a team this time around, thinking that dinner was gonna be fun tonight.

She liked that he was thinking about her. His head was full of thoughts with no destinations, though. She wondered if those flickering ideas were ever going to reach a conclusion. Bear man, gun man, big solid steady man who thought in big solid straight lines made it easy for her to do the same. She smiled.

And kicked her feet some more.

I know that this is a short chapter, but it's just the introductory one. More to come soon, I hope.

Ta