Dear diary: today I was pompous and my sister was crazy.

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2016-05-29T22:15:29Z

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2016-05-29T21:11:08Z

I N B O X
V I S U A L S
P E R M I S S I O N S
L I T T L E.. H A D E S..A P P

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大醫精誠.

2016-05-29T13:52:08Z

( i want you to understand my full meaning. )

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Dear diary: today I was pompous and my sister was crazy.

2016-05-25T22:22:07Z

💀 Player Information
Name: Linds
Age: 31
Contact: peregrina
Characters In-game: Cuthbert Allgood

💀 Character Information
Name: Simon Tam

Canon: Firefly / Serenity

Canon Point: Halfway through the events of "Objects In Space"; Simon contemplates jumping Early, who catches him, takes aim at Simon and warns against it. In this scenario, Simon does get the drop on Early, who abruptly shoots him in the head for his trouble.

Age: 26

Description: Simon is a shuài young doctor of average height and a fairly fit build; he has blue eyes and dark brown hair that's always neatly swept back. He's rarely in anything less casual than a crisp collared shirt, brocade vest and trousers, although Hell may force him to reconsider his wardrobe at some point. If you catch him at the hospital, he'll have a filthy white labcoat thrown over his clothes. (It's perfectly cleaned and ironed when he arrives, of course, but that doesn't last long.)

Physical changes: Simon arrives from Heaven rocking a real holier-than-thou angelic aura. It doesn't show through his clothing, and he'll use a glow-suppressing product to make it less obvious when he's out in the city.

Powers: None.

History: [ HERE ]

Hell Status: Heaven Transfer

What Brings Them To Hell: Of all the possible branches of medicine Simon could've gone into, he chose trauma surgeon; he feels most confident and in control as an expert in his field, and in the midst of crisis and chaos. After the events of Firefly, Simon would be bored to tears in Heaven, a place which would have considerably less injury and action than his post in Capitol City or medic gig on Serenity.

The most difficult part of dying for Simon was leaving River behind, with no one left to protect her. He's determined to find out where she is and what's happened to her, a line of inquiry that's politely hushed and sternly discouraged in Heaven, where any attempted contact with the living world is strictly illegal.

Oh, it's illegal in Hell, too-- not to mention dangerous, ill-advised, and practically impossible in every way-- but by now, Simon has already given up everything he has to save his sister. Now he really has nothing left to lose.

Simon applies for a Hell visa under the pretense of assisting with the everyday deluge of emergency-room cases at Abaddon Hope Hospital, possibly with the intention of opening his own clinic eventually. He's needed more in Hell, you see; Hippocratic Oath and all that.

Privately, Simon hopes to learn more about the illegal channels through which he might have a hope of accessing the living world-- even if it's just to see, for a moment, that River is safe.

And even if he doesn't want to admit it-- which he very much does not-- it's entirely possible that living on the lam for so long has given Simon a taste for something other than the perfectly sterile, wholly appropriate lifestyle that an eternity in Heaven has to offer.

The Pitch:

It's perfectly obvious, if you're familiar with the canon (or even just scanning a wiki page) what's good about Simon. He's extremely intelligent, he's a gifted doctor and a heroic brother, he's handsome and polite.

It's also perfectly boring. A guy like that doesn't belong in Hell. He'd get his gooey self-righteousness and perfection all over everything!

Luckily, Simon's more than all that. He's also a stuck-up, sneaky, clueless punk-ass bitch, and frankly, I think a little time in Hell would only serve to emphasize these far more compelling qualities.

Allow me:

SIMON " XIǍO BÁI " TAM :
an affectionate dressing-down

S T U C K - U P

As well-mannered and pleasant as Simon is, he’s not the kind of guy you'd imagine got invited to a lot of birthday parties as a kid. He is the kind of guy who’s pedantic enough to notice when someone is wrong but, unless they've really started out on the wrong foot, he’s generally too polite to call them on it. He’ll pepper a conversation with stilted trivia where other people might fit personal anecdotes, failing to gauge his audience’s interest and coming off a bit like a know-it-all. You can’t help but feel a certain amount of schadenfreude around him when he’s out of his element-- there’s something really amusing about watching him squirm in boorish or vulgar company, get his hands dirty, or, god forbid, one of his fancy suits. Growing up in the society that he did, he’s accustomed to having the best, and although he's unlikely to make a fuss when he has to go without, it's obvious that he misses the 'embarrassingly large stacks of money' he was making at the hospital in Capitol City.

TL;DR: It's not that Simon thinks he's inherently better than you-- nono, he's not saying that at all. That would be rude. It's just that he did attend the best medical academy in the 'verse and he did graduate in the top 3% of his class and his waistcoats are made from silk brocade and, oh, excuse me, but did you know you just said who when you should've said whom?

As I'm sure Jayne Cobb would agree, he's the kind of guy to whom you'd like to deliver a swift kick in the teeth, and hey! Little Hades can absolutely provide that. In numbers.

S N E A K Y

Don't let the awkward stutter or the heroic doctor act fool you: Simon is a sneaky son-of-a-bitch who lies openly and by omission to the crew of Serenity over and over again throughout the series.

He tells the crew he hired men to break River out, but that's a lie. Our little Lord Fauntleroy actually had the brass balls to walk into a clearly evil black-ops government facility dressed as a uniformed official and break his little sister out himself like a damn boss. A really uptight, kinda prissy boss.

Once he's on Serenity, he abuses his medic status by straight-up doping a ~~valued~~ crew member (okay fine, it's just Jayne) when it looks like he might try for a coup. (Listen, he was totally gonna coup.)

Later, in Ariel, Mr. Who-Me?-I'm-Just-A-Pretty-Doctor goes to the crew with a perfectly-laid plan for robbing the local hospital and selling the drugs on the black market. And in Serenity, while everyone else stares in horror at River's sudden amazing ninja skills, Simon casually drops a Russian safe word that puts her to sleep, prompting the entire crew to wonder why, exactly, if he knew about whole deadly seventeen-year-old superweapon thing, he maybe couldn't have given them a little heads up?

Simon never tells anyone more than they need to know, because dude is a stone-cold Slytherin who takes care of himself and his baby sister before anyone else. Deal with it.

C L U E L E S S

For all his so-called manners, Mr. Top-Three-Percent ain't exactly a genius in the social skills department. This isn't just foot-in-mouth disease we're dealing with, this is handstitched-leather-Oxford-in-mouth disease, which is a very rare and far more severe condition that results in scenarios like the gif pictured above. Good breeding notwithstanding, Simon is massively awkward and really not a people person; he uses his etiquette and River's unstable condition as a shield throughout the series to protect himself from the messy business of making human connection. (Particularly romantic connection with Kaylee, but that's an essay for another gay. Day. Sorry.)

Of course, it's not that he's actually a robot (although Kaylee does specifically call him one); it's more to do with the fact that Simon prefers to stick to what he's good at, and so rarely ventures outside of his comfort zone. And while the chaotic circumstances he's living under on Serenity certainly aren't ideal for close bonding, romantic or otherwise, one gets the impression that he's quite accustomed to compartmentalizing and repressing whatever he has to in order to better fit the mold of the Ideal Son his parents have had him on the hook for from a young age.

That said, when Simon does attempt to relax a little, he tends to overdo it, true to what you'd expect of someone so tightly wound. He reminisces with Kaylee about his commencement-- how he got drunk on sake, climbed a statue of Hippocrates and sang the national anthem loud enough to bring the Feds. And then again, in Jaynestown, he drinks enough mudder's milk to transform into a slurring, unbuttoned, dare-we-even-say affectionate mess.

It's a good look for him, yeah? I think Little Hades can deliver on this one, too.

P U N K - A S S...B I T C H

Simon is oddly abrasive and sarcastic for someone who seems, at first blush, so politic and mild-mannered. He's always rolling his eyes or saying something facetious, particularly at Mal (who learns pretty quickly that the doc bites back) and Jayne (who happens to be an incredibly satisfying target for Simon's arch one-liners). And it's not just a smart mouth, either. He's ruthless when threatened, refusing to work on Kaylee after she's been shot in the stomach unless the Captain turns the ship around and runs from the Feds, and, as pictured above, delivers a swift suckerpunch to Mal after the Captain nearly gets baby-sister killed on a 'routine' job.

And it's the little things, too: calling Jayne a trained ape without the training, or assuring Kaylee with bright sarcasm that yes, he likes 'being forced to live at the ass-end of the galaxy on a piece-of-garbage wreck'. In a brilliantly stereotypical jerk-ass rich kid move, he even admits to bribing the Feds not to tell his parents about his statue-climbing, sake-induced university indiscretions.

Tsk, tsk. Not very angelic behavior, Dr. Tam.

Setting Fit: Simon is perfect for Little Hades because he'll be such a terrible fit. Simon is tidy, predictable and urbane; Little Hades is filthy, chaotic and brutal. If Simon thought Serenity and all its imminent danger and criminal capers was a rude awakening, Little Hades will certainly set him straight.

Simon, whether he wants to admit it or not, will actually thrive in an environment like Abaddon Hope Hospital, where he'll get to show off his skills in a low-tech environment without ever actually having the threat of losing a patient hanging over his head. Little Eden will be an utterly pleasant, safe reminder of what he left behind in Heaven, but he'll still have to navigate the disgusting pandemonium of the city en route to work and back.

And despite what he told the folks in Heaven, Simon's not just in Hell for a little do-gooding. As soon as he feels like he's got a firm footing, or someone he can trust, Simon's going to make some quiet inquiries within Hell backchannels: how to find a loved one somewhere in the underworld, and failing that, how to get in touch with someone in the Living World.

I'm not really interested in reuniting Simon with River in the afterlife, but I definitely think I can use his single-minded devotion to his sister as a motivation for getting him into all sorts of Hell trouble. It's obvious he's not averse to a little criminal activity in the pursuit of finding River and keeping her safe, and the idea of his search drawing him deeper into the Little Hades underground, possibly leaving him indebted to all sorts of unsavory characters is a really appealing one to me.

I think Simon will strike a nice balance between playing the fish-out-of-water and adapting to survive, and I think he'll lend an amusing contrast to many of the current cast members.

Samples: There's a bunch [ HERE ].

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No, this-- this is not funny. This is a morality tale about the evils of sake.

2015-09-01T01:32:05Z

User Name/Nick: Linds
User DW: n/a
AIM/IM: n/a
Other Characters: n/a

Character Name: Simon Tam
Series: Firefly / Serenity
Age: 25
From When?: Simon makes his deal with the Admiral at the beginning of Serenity, after Simon and River are meant to take their leave from the Serenity crew on Beaumond.

Inmate/Warden: Warden. Despite the last year or so he's spent as the most wanted fugitive in the 'verse, Simon Tam has considerably more experience as a civilized, law-abiding member of society. That said, his personality doesn't seem a natural fit for a Warden, either-- he's prissy, easily appalled, and generally makes a point of staying as far away as he can from the criminal element. But the deal he'll strike with the Admiral is backed by a powerful motivator, the very thing that caused an upstanding young trauma surgeon to steal and flee from the Feds in the first place: saving his sister.

Luckily, being on the lam has exposed the formerly tenderfoot doc to plenty of unsavory characters and situations. Simon's proven that, even when he'd really prefer not to, he's capable of finding his feet in dangerous settings and working cooperatively with strong personalities. With that all-important deal driving him, the Admiral can be sure that Simon will channel all of his considerable energy, intelligence and patience into graduating his inmate. He'll also offer up his skills as a doctor and a surgeon.

Item: Simon’s item will be a real sleek ’n shiny holowatch on him at all times.

Abilities/Powers: Simon is a gifted doctor and surgeon with experience working in a high tech, wealthy core planet hospital. More recently, he was the resident medic on a smuggler ship where getting bullet holes/knife wounds/laser burns/etc was typically the order of the day. His medical education includes a general background in psychology, too.

By the time Serenity takes place, Simon seems to have some familiarity with guns--he knows which way to point it, and where one would find the trigger, in the very unlikely event someone is counting on him to shoot. In a fight, his main tactic seems to be throwing himself bodily at someone as a last resort, but if adequately provoked, he can throw a mean suckerpunch.

Personality:

THE BROTHER

The Operative: The boy spent his entire fortune developing the contacts to infiltrate this place.

Dr. Mathias: Gave up a brilliant future in medicine as well. It's madness.

The Operative: Madness? Have you looked at this scan carefully, Doctor? At his face? It's love, in point of fact.
Something a good deal more dangerous.

☤

River: You gave up everything you had to find me. You found me broken. It's hard for you. You gave up everything you had.

Simon: Mei-mei, everything I have is right here.

Simon was born into an affluent, well-to-family on a core planet, and had always thrived within the carefully-laid plans his parents made for him. His sister River had been different— more playful, more brilliant, less willing to fall in line— and for most of Simon’s young life, she was the only person he could truly be a kid around. As much as they had in common, Simon sometimes couldn’t imagine where she’d come from; everything that terrified him thrilled her, everything he accepted, she’d question. She was his little sister, and for a long time, his best friend. And she was, of course, the very notable exception to his reliable adherence to the status quo-- her endangerment caused him to go completely off the rails, putting his career, his relationship with his parents, and his entire life in jeopardy. And even now, it's clear from the way Simon talks about River that she's still the most precious thing he has, even though at times his little sister seems lost inside the experiment, even though she's been the unwitting agent of chaos in a life he'd otherwise polished to a civilized, sterile sheen.

Seeing River struggle with the effects of the Blue Sun experimentation has been agonizing for Simon, whose practical, cerebral approach to everything finds him fixated with repairing what’s been broken. There’s not a whole lot of time for reflection in their new life on the run, but it's obvious he grapples with some murky feelings of guilt, resentment and frustration when confronted with how drastically his life has changed in the last year, and how lost they still are despite the sacrifices he's made. Rather than dwell on an unhelpful and imprecise emotional state-- an area he's never been particularly adept at navigating anyway-- Simon throws himself into searching for a cure for River and trying to land on his well-heeled feet in a world that couldn't be more different from the one he left behind.

THE DOCTOR

Simon: I am very smart. I went to the best Medacad in Osiris, top three percent of my class, finished my internship in eight months.
Gifted is the term.

☤

Simon: You're in a dangerous line of work, Jayne. Odds are you'll be under my knife again, often. So I want you to understand one thing very clearly: no matter what you do or say or plot, no matter how you come down on us, I will never, ever harm you. You're on this table, you're safe, 'cause I'm your medic. And however little we may like or trust each other, we're on the same crew. Got the same troubles, same enemies, and more than enough of both. Now, we could circle each other and growl, sleep with one eye open, but that thought wearies me. I don't care what you've done, I don't know what you're planning on doing, but I'm trusting you. I think you should do the same. 'Cause I don't see this working any other way.

Although it’s debatable exactly how much of Simon’s picture-perfect life on Osiris was a result of him falling in line with his parents' expectations, it’s clear that being a doctor is tied up inextricably with his sense of identity. Even when he’s kidnapped by a hill clan in need of a doctor, when he arrives at the village and sees the sick, he rolls up his sleeves without trying to drive a bargain or complain. While he certainly takes his oath seriously and has a genuine drive to help those in need, there’s another, baser motivation keeping him going, and that’s his ever-present need for control. Simon is never more cool, calm and collected than when he’s in medic mode, and keeping his hands and mind busy is another way of exercising authority and avoiding the uncomfortable emotions that might threaten to throw him off his very tightly-managed course.

Simon’s bedside manner definitely leaves something to be desired, a fact he undoubtedly took into consideration when he chose to become a trauma surgeon; seems that doped-up and unconscious folks are less concerned with that sort of thing. He’s perfectly professional, but won’t be winning any Dr. Congeniality prizes anytime soon, particularly if there’s any tension between him and his patient to begin with. Anyone fitting that description on his table is generally a captive audience for his very dry sense of humor and sarcasm.

THE RICH KID

Mal: The management here don't take too kindly to sightseers, but that's why we're posing as buyers. There ain't a one of us looks the part more than the good doctor. The pretty fits, soft hands, definitely a monied individual. All rich and lily-white, pasty all over—

Simon: Alright! Fine. I'll go. Just... stop describing me.

☤

Kaylee: What's so damn important about being proper? It don't mean
nothing out here in the black.

Simon: It means more out here.

As well-mannered and pleasant as Simon is, he’s not the kind of guy you'd imagine got invited to a lot of birthday parties as a kid. He is the kind of guy who’s pedantic enough to notice when someone is wrong but, unless they've really started out on the wrong foot, he’s generally too polite to call them on it. He’ll pepper a conversation with stilted trivia where other people might fit personal anecdotes, failing to gauge his audience’s interest and coming off a bit like a know-it-all. You can’t help but feel a certain amount of schadenfreude around him when he’s out of his element-- there’s something really amusing about watching him squirm in boorish or vulgar company, get his hands dirty, or, god forbid, one of his fancy suits. Growing up in the society that he did, he’s accustomed to having the best, but you’d never see him make a fuss when he has to go without; he’s too polite and politic for that. Simon wears his manners like armor— they form a barrier between him and the rest of the world, assuring him he has a script for every conversation and a civilized reaction on hand for all the decidedly uncivilized behavior he runs into.

Simon's not repressed-- Simon’s like a tightly corked bottle that's spent the last handful of years under immense pressure, shaken to extremes. He rarely gives any sign of the stress he’s under, partly because he learned at a young age that stress is only worth regard insofar as it pushes you to achieve-- it’s not something you alleviate, it’s something you use. Growing up as the oldest child in the Tam household meant learning to carefully tweak and rearrange his own desires to better match what was expected of him, and the impulse to unbutton a bit or deviate from that mild, unobjectionable persona is buried under years of habit.

Despite all of this, he is capable of warming up and cutting loose in the right situation, and on those occasions, true to what you’d expect of someone so painstakingly restrained, he tends to overdo it a little, getting drunk and unruly enough to draw the attention of the Feds once in his college days and, more recently, drinking enough mudder’s milk in Jaynestown to transform him into a slurring, affectionate mess. Simon's also capable of being very funny, though his deadpan sarcasm and dry, sometimes dark sense of humor aren't for everyone. And although he's slumming with criminals by necessity, it's plain to see over the course of Firefly that a little lawlessness really suits Simon, whether he's ready to acknowledge it or not.

THE " CRIMINAL MASTERMIND "

Book: I'd forgotten, you're moonlighting as a criminal mastermind now. Got your next heist planned?

Simon: No… but I'm thinking about growing a big black mustache. I'm a traditionalist.

☤

Simon: I never-- never shot anyone before.
Book: I was there, son. I'm fair sure you haven't shot anyone yet.

Despite the pretty fits and lily-white hands, once he warms up to Serenity a bit, Simon actually develops some competence in the realm of the less-than-legal. In Ariel, he offers himself up as a client for the crew, developing a plan and helping to execute the infiltration of a core planet hospital, all so he can sneak River inside to use a cutting-edge brain imaging machine to get a better sense of what the Alliance did to her. In return, he outlines exactly how Mal and Zoe can access and raid the hospital dispensary, thereby paying their cut in a load of drugs sure to fetch a pretty penny on the black market. Although complications arise, none of them are due to an oversight of Simon’s: the plan is seamless, and he’s obviously pleased not just by its success, but by his ability to contribute to the crew in a way that doesn’t involve forceps and anaesthetics.

He's a planner by nature, preferring to map out every possible detail of a procedure, and to take as long as he has to to be sure it’s watertight. He spends two years establishing the right contacts on Osiris when he finds out about River’s endangerment, and although he initially seeks help from his wealthy, well-connected parents— especially on one memorable occasion when his father had to bail him out of prison for his underground inquiries— he isn’t deterred from his goal when they fail him. He disguises himself as an Alliance official in order to break into the facility where River is held and uses a stun grenade to incapacitate the doctor, allowing he and his sister to escape via an elevator shaft and a waiting getaway shuttle. Later, after he and River board Serenity, he makes a contentious power play out of desperation, refusing to treat Kaylee’s stomach wound if Mal turns them over to the Alliance. When Mal and Wash find themselves held hostage, Simon takes up a gun for the first time and goes in with the rest of the crew for a rescue.

In his determination to protect River, Simon’s quite prepared to bend his own typically rigid rules of propriety and morality. Otherwise, he’s a mostly straitlaced, uptight individual who prefers to clean up messes rather than make them, although his time on Serenity has blurred those lines a bit.

Barge Reactions: While Simon Tam has a general rule of not making deals with shadowy figures aboard space prisons, his urgent predicament with River means he's approaching this agreement with the utmost initiative: the plan is to get to work immediately, and use all the resources available to him to get the job done as quickly as possible.

Thing is, despite what the last few years should have taught him, Simon's not very good at anticipating when the gǒushǐ is about to hit the fan.

He's going to be even more out of his element than he was on Serenity, and will probably find his confident, redeemin'-criminals-and-takin'-names attitude starting to crumble the minute he gets a taste of what the Barge is really like. He'll probably make a point of seeking out other wardens he can trust, people who've been there awhile, people with rank and status, and do what he can to ally with them. He'll certainly throw himself into his work in order to keep busy, and if it takes awhile for him to be paired with a criminal, expect the infirmary to be reorganized and gleaming within his first week on board.

Magic is going to really break Simon's rational little brain and it's going to take him a long time to get used to the idea; he's certainly not planning on letting anyone touch him with the stuff, and would be pretty skeptical about its medical applications.

He's going to make a point of staying away from as much of the danger and chaos as possible, particularly trying to avoid trouble with the more temperamental personalities, but historically, his success rate for this kind of thing isn't great.

Path to Redemption: n/a

Deal: Simon’s deal with the Admiral would entirely revolve around his wunderkind little sister, River, who’s essentially being held hostage and experimented on by an ~evil government program. There are a few ways I could interpret that deal. First, Simon could ask for the universe to arrange that River never attend the school in the first place. This is the most obvious option, because it spares River all of her trauma, and it would also allows for the trajectory of Simon’s life— med school and a successful career as a trauma surgeon— to play out the way he believes it should have.

However, I’d like to put Simon in a position to contemplate the what ifs of messing around with the natural course of time: what if the universe responds by robbing River of her genius, so she’s never asked to the academy? Does Simon really want to return to a normal life knowing that his parents were more concerned with their lifestyle remaining status quo than saving their daughter, or worse, complicit in the Blue Sun program? Is Simon ready to give up the life experiences and growth he’s undergone since rescuing River— planning her break-out, their stay on Serenity, and, eventually, his time on the Barge? If possible, I’d like to see him struggle with all of these concepts, and possibly change his mind a few times about what his Deal really is. In the end, his motivation will always be to rescue/save/fix/protect River, regardless of how he decides to approach it.

Personally, I’d like to see him come to the conclusion that what’s done is done, and instead focus his energy on finding a way to heal River, and a way for them to have some shot at a normal, not-fugitive life. I’d be happy for this to translate to multiple deals/warden roles for Simon.

History: Here's a brief summary of the Firefly premise, and here's a closer look at Simon himself.

Sample Journal Entry: [5-10 sentences (of spoken/written monologue, not including narration) 1st Person POV. This sample should reflect the character's day-to-day behavior and a distinctive voice. Must be Barge setting specific.]

[ The video begins. Simon is seated at a desk, wearing a crisp blue dress shirt and a pewter vest. ]

Ah, hello, everyone. My name is-- [ a moment of hesitation; it feels so wrong to be announcing himself on the cortex like this, even if he's been assured it's safe ] -- Simon Tam. I'll be working in the Infirmary as a doctor, and, if need be, a surgeon for the foreseeable future. I look forward to meeting you all, and if you have any questions, please feel free to stop by the Infirmary and see me.

[ That's really all Simon feels the needs to announce. But it doesn't seem like enough, and he wants to give the Admiral the impression that he's putting in a lot of effort, so... ]

I, ah. I was a trauma surgeon at a great hospital on Osiris, and I have some [ he scratches a little sheepishly behind his ear, squinting ] more recent experience working on board a ship-- much, um, smaller than this one, but-- I was doing lots of... odd jobs. Seeing the 'verse.

[ He raises his eyebrows at the camera and gives a narrow-lipped smile before he takes a breath. Yes, that's all the public speaking he can manage for today. ]

Ah, as I said, I look forward to meeting all of you very soon. Thank you... ...for your time.

[ Wǒ de mā what was that? He shuts it off, wincing slightly just as the feed cuts. ]

Sample RP: [3-5 paragraphs, 3rd Person POV. Must be Barge setting specific.]

{{ But I think when they triggered you, it somehow brought this up. This memory. }}
{{ It isn't mine. The memory, it isn't mine. And I shouldn't have to carry it. It isn't mine. Don't make me sleep again. }}
{{ I won't. I won't. }}
{{ Put a bullet to me. Bullet in the brain pan. Squish. }}

Simon wakes up with a gasp, sitting bolt upright in bed. He puts a hand to his sweat-damp forehead, and it takes him a moment to place where he is. Yesterday and everything that happened... it feels cramped, somehow; packed with too many hours and incongruous memories. He wonders briefly if he was drugged, and how long he's been sleeping-- everything feels off.

But perhaps that's just a normal side-effect of making implausible contracts with mysterious, shadowy figures; Simon wouldn't know, this is all very new to him.

The room he's in looks like a much larger version of his cabin on Serenity, a spartan layout done in the same muted yellows with shoji screens over the windows. It must default to whatever room you slept in last. Neat. Slightly creepy, but neat.

He takes a moment to look around, to catch his breath, and to process everything that's happened. His jaw is sore, and the memory of Mal messing it up is still perfectly clear, as is the fight they had which led to Simon's decision to leave Serenity with River once they landed on Beaumonde. He remembers winding through the streets of New Dunsmuir with his sister in tow, and then--

And then he remembers someone finding them. At first, Simon hadn't even wanted to meet their gaze, had wanted to just keep moving-- the last thing they needed was a run-in with a mugger or a plainclothes officer-- but the figure had known more than anyone possibly could know, not just about who Simon and River were but about what she needed; the cure he'd been searching for.

So I won't really be leaving her side? he'd asked, heart hammering in his throat. I go, I do the job, I come back right here: to this moment. And I'll be able to fix what they've done?

As irresponsible and insane as it felt, as monumentally strange as the entire encounter was, it was still, incredibly, his best option. Even on Serenity-- which had been as close to laying low as Simon could have expected-- they had barely avoided capture. Out here alone, in unfamiliar territory, cut off from his credit accounts?

It was the end of the line.

You could go back to Serenity. Mal would take you back, the others would--

Jiàn tā de guǐ-- no. It was delaying the inevitable. And The Admiral had intimated that if Simon kept his end of the deal, a timeline could be arranged in which the Academy never got their hands on River in the first place.

--Yes, he'd said, cutting the stranger off. I'll do it.

Which brings him to where he is now. Where he's apparently going to serve as a warden on a spacebound prison barge to an as-yet-unnamed inmate. Considering the fact that he's not exactly qualified for real corrections work, he's figuring it must be some kind of corporate embezzler or something similar; an amateur, white collar criminal in need of a slap on the wrist, maybe a few months of ethics seminars and some mandatory legal review before Simon can prove his rehabilitation.

Right? Because despite what one might conclude from the company he's kept for the last year or so, he's not exactly well-versed in criminal psychology. He can't be expected to actually oversee another person in any real remedial sense. ...right?

On a more routine note, he'd also agreed to help out in the Infirmary; after a few months of dealing with the kind of gè zhǒng líng luàn chaos on Serenity, Simon figures he's more than prepared to handle the day-to-day minutiae of an institutional sick bay.

And when you're done, this nightmare will finally be over. River will be safe.

Simon walks over to the paper screens and slides them aside, exposing a huge wall of window that shows a dizzying number of stars winking in the black.

"I really hope you know what you're doing," he mutters to himself.

Just hang on, mèimei.

Special Notes: Sorry about the very fast & loose Mandarin. Also you may remember me from a cameo as Randall Flagg a few weeks ago! Sorry about that, too.

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gifted_idiot @ 2013-06-20T10:08:00

2013-06-20T14:43:45Z

The facility is so unlike anything Simon expected that he has to wonder if he's dreaming.

If he is, it's an incredibly compelling dream. Of course, it would be, if his brain is hopped up on whatever complex cocktail of enactogens and nootropics they've been using on River for the last three years.

The cell, while bizarre, had at least seemed real. The tech was slightly behind what he'd expect of an Alliance-funded facility, and the mention of quarantine had been out of left field; probably a futile attempt at a cover-up. But whatever they'd given him had made it impossible to stay awake for long, and when he wakes the second time, he finds himself sprawled on a dias in a massive atrium.

Huge sections of the walls are missing, with crushed panels revealing a mess of wires and pipes; alternately scorched and rusted, it looks like a room that's seen several dozen natural disasters in a relatively short time span. Without the benefit of the hologram's identification of the space station Proserpina he might not have been able to guess the building's use or origin, but knowing that allows him to put the pieces together, and he's able to pick out what had once been the customs center. The concourses. Storefronts.

He lifts himself up off the floor with some effort. Checks the pockets and the front of the jumpsuit he's in for any identifying marks. Nothing.

He's unarmed, stripped of everything he'd had on him when he'd been knocked out, and apparently alone. There's a mad urge to shout hello?! that he manages to curb, for now, anyway. Simon steps off the platform and makes his way across the room, watching his back, over to the huge observation window, which is rimmed with exoteric lights that do most of the illumination for the inside of the chamber. Seems like the power went out a long time ago.

"Where am I," he mutters to himself, looking out at the stars.

And where is River?

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