Title: On The Shelf
Fandom: Firefly/Serenity
Pairing: Mal/Inara
Rating: Hard R for angry sex
Het/Slash/Both: Het

Warnings: Spoilers for SERENITY movie

Timeline: Takes place a few weeks post-movie

A/N: Done for Medie's Porn Battle (prompt: dust), and will not be the only fic I write for this little foofooraw. Beta'd by rogueapprentice, my Malnara guru, but I finagled it, so all mistakes and general suckiness are still mine alone.

For rogueapprentice and foxxcub, two of my favorite Browncoats, Malnara 'shippers and writers and fangirls, because they kick my ass in this department. And, naturally, for the one who is to BLAME for the ficspam and the fandom whoring, my beloved crack dealer, lollobrigida.


* * * * *

There was dust gathering on the blanket.

Zoe couldn’t stop herself from pausing in front of the little alcove just off the bridge, where a thick knit blanket sat on a section of paneling that acted as a sort of shelf...one that might get missed if one wasn’t looking for it. Lucky for her and Wash, they’d found it was the perfect place for The Blanket...the one they always wrapped up in whenever she’d catch him at the controls and just couldn’t wait...

A sound caught her attention, putting Zoe on her guard as she peered around the corner...

...and wondered if maybe she hadn’t hit her head when she got out of bed to take a walk instead of one of Doc Tam’s sleeping pills.

Inara must have had the same idea, because the deep red shift she wore was sheer, leaving little to the imagination, her lovely robe in a heap on the floor. It must have started as an argument, which didn’t much surprise Zoe...she was cursing and he was grabbing her hard enough to bruise as she straddled his waist in the pilot’s chair, shift riding up on her thighs.

Mal’s hands hid Inara’s breasts for a moment as he let them fill his greedy palms, mouth fastening to her neck as he growled and snarled in Chinese and English while she worked at the fly of his pants to try and snake her hand inside.

“Gorram ta ma duh, you and your tight pants!” Inara snarled breathlessly, finally earning a low, strangled groan from Mal as Zoe saw his hips lift into her touch.

“Trust me, I’m workin’ on it.” he rasped, pulling her in for an almost violent kiss.

It wasn’t the sex that kept Zoe rooted to the spot as she watched Mal tear the gauzy red fabric separating him from Inara’s lovely body...it was the tiny motes of dust rising around them, floating off of Wash’s dinosaurs, seeming to move in time with Inara’s body once Mal was inside her, still for only a moment as her eyes slid shut before the feel of him called to her body, forcing her to move. It was the life that filled the old sheepskin covered seat as they found their rhythm, as Mal surged up to bite and lick at her flawless skin, leaving red marks of his teeth and soft bruises of his claim on her, however temporary it might be.

It was the violence...the passion...the love that didn’t yet have form. And there was love as Inara rode him, as Mal tasted her skin and tangled his fingers in her hair to fuse their mouths as one, their cries of satisfaction merging, coalescing together as sweat-slicked bodies melted into each other, dissolved in the heat they created.

Zoe knew the chair was a comfortable place...warm and encompassing. After his death, it reminded her of Wash’s arms when she would sit there and drift off to sleep on nights that ran together after a long enough while.

It had been too long since she’d seen the dust motes dance that way on the bridge.

And it was nice to take the blanket down, to shake off the dust and give it purpose again once she was sure they’d both fallen asleep in the pilot’s chair. They would probably know who had covered them, and Zoe knew they would probably find another place for the blanket if they ever used it again.

But a small part of her hoped they found her little shelf...that maybe if they kept the dust from collecting there, along with her grief, then maybe she might have an easier time of sleeping at night.