Apologies

Silently, Mal pushed the door open before him. Pneumatically, it sighed and he winced. ‘Gorram door, never’d used to complain’, he grumbled to himself. But then, maybe it had. He’d never really paid it any mind, always just walked on through, before.

Inside all was silence, and emptiness. There was hardly a sign that the shuttle had ever been anything else than what it was now: just a shuttle, no character, until someone came to give it one, give it a purpose, give it a direction.

He’d almost forgotten how impersonal a shuttle could be. Just something to get you from here to there. Now, Serenity, she had personality in spades but her shuttles … frankly he’d never given it a thought, never felt the lack before … before … she’d come.

And gone.

Damn the woman. There had been so much to say to her he’d always just kept talking so as she wouldn’t notice, thinking always someday there’d be more time, or he’d get it straight, or – Hell, Mal couldn’t even fool himself anymore.

He took a deep breath of the emptiness outside to equalize the pressure on the emptiness inside, and whispered into the void “I’m sorry.”




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