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Mal was thrown back to his ship during the fray - by my own mother keeps circling his mind - but as soon as his door to Milliways was finally back, he ran through at a breakneck pace.

Everything's quiet again. Things might be a shambles, but everything is so quiet.

"Ma!"

Well, except for Mal himself.

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Sallie is just now sitting up, pushing up with her hands (not recognizing the lack of pain that normally comes from bending her wrists that way) to try and take in her surroundings.

"How is this possible?"

Nobody's seen her. Oh god, nobody's seen her. Her apartment, maybe she made it back to --

Mal doesn't turn the doorknob so much as nearly tear the door off its hinges. He finds Sallie sitting on the floor and he falls to his knees next to his mother.

"Oh, Ma," he breathes. Reaching out for her hands, "Are you alright?"

Sallie is about to answer. Almost. There is much to say, and ask, and check up with, when

Sallie's hand lands in her son's

Landing on Serenity's cargo bay grating

River

"Gonna be okay, cap'n."

Sallie shrieks and recoils.

"Ma! What hurts? What is it?"

She pulled back from me!

"I can go get the Doc -- "

"No! Just let me -- let me sit here, damnit, son."

Sallie's breathing hard, now, and she doesn't -- what is all this?

"I'm fine. I swear it."

"Then what was that about?"

Now that Mal's own heart rate is back in his chest instead of his throat, he changes position and sits cross-legged beside his mother.

"The screamin'?" Mal swallows. "Rememberin' what's happened?"

"No, I -- I saw you. 'Gonna be okay, cap'n'," Sallie intones. "River said that to you."

Um.

"How did you know that? Did you -- did you see that when you threw me out?"

Which we're still talking on, by the way.

"When I touched your hand.

"Malcolm, the crystal...exploded, and what came out of it went through me. I don't understand what happened. Not really."

"It could've been anything, Ma," Mal offers (somewhat desperately to his own ears).

"But."

"But?"

"You need to try again. You have to see if it's -- if it's some kind of fluke."

"What? No, no -- "

"Ma!

"I won't allow you to go through life not being able to stand my hand on yours."

He's right. "When did you get so smart," Sallie mumbles.

She reaches out again, and

"Inara I have to go back - help me search!"

"There's no door, Mal. You have to wait."

"Wash, change course - we're heading for Shadow -- "

"You know you can't take Serenity to Shadow, son."

Mal gasps.

"Can you stand? We're goin' to find Simon."

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