Heritage and a Dowry

Unfortunately, Pa was smart enough to not trust my Ma to guard over me. Far from bein’ worried I might hit my own mother to escape, I reckon he had a pretty good notion ‘bout how I’d got away from him ‘fore. He wasn’t ‘bout to let me run out on him a second time, not when he had a gun trained on me and knew there was still a price on my head. So, he took me with him to make his calls. It was one of those Your Hair Is Leavin’ The Room, I Suggest You Follow It situations that I’d normally end up all hot an’ bothered over, but seein’ as how it was my old man yankin’ me downstairs by the hair to sell me off to the highest bidder… Ain’t really my cup of tea, so to speak.

The commotion woke up the whole house, my three youngest brothers, and my little sister. I think only Jacob really remembered me any. He’d been seven when I’d left, and’d just come into manhood recently. Robert looked as though he had vague memories of some long-lost sister, and to Thomas, I was some kinda legend taken flesh. ‘Course, Petra, my little sister, knew me only as the standard she had to live up to. She was cold, that one, already had the courtier’s mask to hide her ‘motions at eight, and she didn’t speak a word, just sat there at the dinin’ room table starin’ at me, like she was studyin’ me.

Ma’d quietly filled me in on everything I’d missed. Blake and Connor’d found ‘emselves wives and settled down offworld to work and make lots of grandbabies for her. Dylan’d signed on as crew for some transport ship, and Greg’d gone and enlisted in the elite ranks of the ‘lliance military. Things were pretty much the same ‘round home – same bills, same problems. I had to act like I cared. I did, really. Always did wonder whatever happened to all my brothers, and my Ma. But at that moment, I was more worried ‘bout what was gonna happen to me.

She looked down at my hand and saw the ring Td’d put on my finger not even a week before. And then at the bracelet Duncan’d given me the night of the ants in the ‘verse ball. And she saw the pain in my eyes, not just from getting’ caught and facin’ years of jailtime, but from everything else… My own failed marriage to Aeon… All the heartache I’d felt cuz I’d fallen in love with Td and couldn’t do nothin’ ‘bout it cuz of the situation… Of unexpectedly fallin’ in love with Duncan, ‘long with the miserable knowledge that I couldn’t give him what he wanted, what he deserved, that I couldn’t make him happy. The worry ‘bout all the people I loved on the two moons I called home, what with the gorram bots getting’ worse. She looked into my eyes and knew I was truly her daughter, who, like her, felt everything, who walked through life with the weight of the ‘verse on her shoulders. It near killed me to not be able to tell her all of it, to confess myself, all my sins, my wrongs, to the woman who’d taught me what it was to want to be a good person.

Pa didn’t notice nothin’ til he searched me. At what point, he became real interested in the ring and bracelet. Wanted to know if either man’d be willin’ to pay for my hide. An idea occurred to me then… It was risky, but at least I could get a message through. Maybe it was selfish of me, but I’d hoped nobody’d actually be fool ‘nough to show up with money to buy me… I’d hoped they’d realize it was just me tryin’ to let folks know what happened…

So, he sent waves to Nack, Seana, Td, and Duncan, sayin’ he’d be sellin’ my miserable hide to the highest bidder, and that the ‘lliance and my ex fiancé, one Christopher Barnett’d also be contacted to make their bids. I knew Nack and Seana at least’d see it for what it was – information ‘bout my whereabouts. Td and Duncan, though? God only knew whether they’d see it as that, or as a genuine plea for help from me. If either of ‘em knew me half as well as I’d hoped, they wouldn’t show up with a pile of money. Hell, that’s even if any of ‘em, ‘sides Td, could figure out who the hell Alexandra MacLaren was.

After that, it was me tied to a chair while my family looked on. Pa heard from the Feds first. Said they’d be sendin’ someone out to discuss the arrangement. That chilled my blood. Why was it that important for them to apprehend someone after eleven years who was only suspected of shootin’ a man? Shootin’, not even killin’. If it’d really been me, I woulda killed him. But why would they even be interested in me as my old self?

Petra kept watchin’ me. I reckon, the longer we sat there starin’ at eachother, the more I realized she was more my sister’n I’d imagined. I wondered how much she’d been told ‘bout me, if she even knew she’d had an older sister. But, she did know. That look in her eyes, the one that spoke of resentment, said it all. And suddenly, I knew. I could see her thoughts behind those cold, blue eyes. She envied that I’d escaped, and hated me for comin’ back and getting’ caught. She wanted me to get free and take her away to wherever it was I was… Oh no.

I’d touched her mind, opened myself up to her so I could get in and see what she was thinkin’, and she’d plowed right on into my head like a bulldozer. I broke the connection soon as I realized what’d happened, but that didn’t undo any of the damage, it didn’t erase anything she’d seen in my head. She saw my name, she saw Td and Duncan, she saw the many faces of the folks I cherish in my heart. She saw Blackburne and Hale’s Moon. Firefly’s. Fook Yoo’s. Where I’d docked Merkabah. The locket. The future I saw for her. Maybe it was just a jumble of images that meant nothin’ to her, or maybe she understood it all. I could only hope for the former. And I couldn’t look at her anymore. Her aura’d tinted. Just from seein’ in my head. Damn.

So, we sat there waitin’ for responses. There was some small talk as I’d told my family how I’d been livin’ out on the rim. Thomas wanted to know if I’d ever seen a Reaver. I told him ‘bout how the Reavers’d crash land on the planet and make their way into town, how terrifyin’ it was, ‘specially that first night in town over a year ago, when I’d wandered out into the night and one’d attacked me right there, chased me right back to the bar… But how we’d learned to expect ‘em, and to fight ‘em, and to survive ‘em. I even showed Thomas the scar on my back… well, the top of it, anyway. Think I mighta became his personal hero. When you’re twelve, comin’ face to face with someone who’d fought Reavers and won was just ‘bout up there with shakin’ hands with the king of all Londinium.

That was when Petra spoke. All she said was “Butterfly,” but gorram. It meant she knew. A thought occurred to me at that point. I’d made the assumption that my…ability…to see peoples’ auras was some sorta mutation caused by livin’ on Blackburne, and what Jayne’d called “an injudicious exploration of the Wastes” in all that radiation. I’d wondered if it wasn’t somethin’ x0x0 did to me when she knocked me out that one time. Bump. X0x0 herself says it was from the night I’d spent with Lieutenant Juniper, she said he’d opened up a part of my mind in that exchange. Then, there was that ‘lliance document x0x0’d found on that ship parked in Washtown, wantin’ samples of my DNA ‘cuz of… what’d happened with the Lieutenant. So, while I just assumed I was a mutant and my ability was caused by the radiation, there was always the question in the back of my mind… Was it really the radiation? But here and now, my little sister just dove into my mind like it was nothin’, like she’d done it a million times before. And then there was my Ma, how she always seemed to know things ‘bout people, how she could look in my eyes and see my soul. Which begged the question… Was it in me all along and just needed some fine tunin’ or a good knock to get it workin’ right? And of course, there was this new development, the bein’ able to touch minds. This was gonna require some very serious analyzin’ at some future juncture.

So there I was, waitin’ to find out what’d happen in the next few hours. ‘Cuz really, everything depended on that. I’d either be rottin’ in an Alliance jail cell, dead, on my way home, or somebody’s property. I didn’t so much like my odds, ‘specially since the Feds were already on their way. Guess, though, I’d have to wait and see. Wasn’t exactly like I had a choice in the matter anyhow.