Who: Candy and Mal. What: Flying. When: 5/26. Where: Coffee shop, then Phoenix. Rating/Warnings: PG-13 for language. Status: In Progress.
Mal was tired. He’d been on this god damn stakeout for four god damn hours, and he wanted some god damn food. He dragged ass into a diner as soon as he hit the Anaheim city limits, easing onto a stool. “Burger and fries,” he told the waitress, stifling a yawn. He needed fuel or he’d barely make it home to Oscar.
Candy wished she could smoke in California restaurants, but supposed it was having an intended effect; she did smoke less now. Holding a pen like a smoke, she nibbled on the cap as she read out of her psych book. Class was still boring, but more tolerable since she was part-time and working for the Agency. She smiled when the guy sat down next to her, nodding at him to acknowledge his presence, before going back to her cup of black coffee.
Mal nodded at the girl, though he did wonder why she was here alone when it was getting dark. She looked a little young.
He tucked into his food, feeling a little bit of brainpower return. Next time, he vowed, he would risk the food smell alerting his target. He was just starting to feel human.
After a few minutes, though, he saw the girl close her book. Something made him ask. “Excuse me. Um. I’m not meaning to be rude, but I was wondering if you might like an escort home? It’s getting dark, and sometimes stuff happens.” This wasn’t the roughest part of Anaheim, but he knew there had been some stuff going on.
She was packing up when she heard the guy next to her asking if she wanted an escort home. She’d just been planning on flying, but she didn’t think this guy would be okay with flying in a mostly invisible craft. So a walk home would be okay. “You sure? I’m not super close.” She couldn’t help but grin. If only he knew.
“I don’t mind. I mean, if you can handle it, I’ll butt out. Just, I know the gangs are starting to move into this part of town.” Mal didn’t want to push, lest she think he was a creep.
“I can, but ... that was really nice of you.” She smiled and extended her hand. Candy hadn’t taken off her leather jacket the whole time she’d been in the diner, if only because people gawking at her scars was exhausting. “I’m Candy LeBeau, it’s nice to meet you.”
“Mal Reynolds.” He shook it, nodding. “I never know if a girl’s going to get pissed off if I offer, but doesn’t cost me anything to offer. I’m good at ducking.” One girl had tried to hit him, then started going on about the patriarchy, whatever that was.
“Bob and weave,” Candy laughed. She’d have offered to buy the guy a drink if she weren’t in recovery. “You look like the kind of guy who ladies don’t get mad at too often, though.”
“Eh, I manage.” Mal smiled a little. She wasn’t his type, and he was pretty sure that was a ring on her finger anyway. “I just got a dog, and Oscar’s the one who gets all the ladies.” He paid his check, leaving as much as he could afford for the tip - slightly less than 15%, probably, but he tried.
“What kind? My husband and I have a pitbull rottie mix.” Ruby was the sweetest, silliest thing. Candy was stupid over her dog.
“He’s just a mutt. I picked him up on the side of the road when I was driving from Arizona to here.” Mal might possibly have had a photo on his phone that he showed to her.
Grinning, Candy couldn’t help but pull out her phone and show off a picture of herself, Remy, and Ruby on her boat. “Oscar’s handsome, of course you can’t get any ladies with him around.”
“Yeah, it’s true.” Mal chuckled. “Aw, yours is sweet, too. Boy or girl?” The husband was kind of smirky-looking, but they looked happy together, so he couldn’t really judge.
“Girl, her name’s Ruby.” Candy smiled brightly, pleased that someone saw how cute Ruby was instead of being scared of her. People tended to hear ‘pitbull rottie mix’ and flinch.
“Good name.” Mal made sure his stuff was all together. “Oscar just looked like an Oscar to me. And he seems to like it. I grew up on a horse ranch, so I’m used to animals.”
“Really? You do have a sort of ... dunno, cowboyish charm to you.” At least in Candy’s eyes - he was kind, gentlemanly, but folksy. He reminded her of people back home. Well, the nice ones.
“I’m just glad I don’t have the accent, no offense. People don’t take you seriously.” Mal meant it. Even in Phoenix he’d been made fun of behind his back for his country type ways.
“Oh, none taken. My dad has the redneck accent - I’m from a tiny town in Minnesota.” Candy laughed. “Only they didn’t do much horse ranching, mostly cows and chickens.” And in the dreams, just chickens.
“So more like a dairy farm type of place?” Mal held the door open for her as she gathered her things. “Might have been nice.”
“Not really, my dad worked at a kind of dairy factory, really. This isn’t the nice no hormones, grass fed kinda town. This is cow jail.” She wrinkled her nose. She wasn’t really a fan of where she’d grown up. Or his dad.
“Ew.” Mal made a face. “Thanks, I’ll pass. Is that where you met your man?” They started walking down the street slowly.
“Oh, no, I met him here. I bartended right after I moved here, and he came in and was gorgeous. But he’s smart, and funny - that’s the part that kind of hooked me.” She stood up, walking with Mal outside.
“Good answer.” He risked teasing her a little. “Things seem a little unusual here, so maybe it’s best to meet somebody here who knows.” Was that too cryptic? He just knew the dream crap kept happening.
“Do you dream?” Her mismatched eyes lit up. “Because if you do, I was just gonna fly myself home.”
“I’ve had some weird ones, yeah ... the hell do you mean, fly?” Mal’s eyebrows shot up.
“You know. In the air.” She waggled her fingers a little, light trailing around the tips.
“Well, yeah, but ...” Mal trailed off, eyes getting wider when he saw the light around her fingertips. “What the hell kind of place is this?”
“The property tax is ridiculous, apparently.” She couldn’t help but wisecrack. “You said you have those dreams, right? The ones that are too real to just be dreams? Well, sometimes you get presents from them. Or ... abilities.”
“Abilities?” Mal echoed, then felt stupid. “Well. I never heard about any of that. I just had a dream about being on a spaceship sometime in the future, but we talked like we were in a Western. But then some Chinese, too. It was weird. I don’t know.”
“So you, you might wake up one day knowing how to pilot stuff, or knowing Chinese. I dream that I’m an incantatrix. Er. I know magic.” Not everyone knew the Abaratian words for things, sometimes she forgot, especially when she used them so often. Remy had just learned to stifle his laughter when she said things like neffernow.
“Magic. Now, that’s not something I could believe, until I saw the little fairy sparkles from your hands.” Mal was mostly amused - he wasn’t that tired as to hallucinate, surely?
She smiled and shrugged. “Try waking up being able to do it. I thought I’d died or something, and that I was seeing shit. Or I’d started having some sort of brain disease or something.” She spoke a few words and started to hover off of the ground. “Nope, it’s a thing. There’s people way better at it than me, too.”
“Jesus.” Mal stared, secretly glad he hadn’t jumped or anything. “That’s so ... well. Weird, but probably comes in handy. Does everybody get this kind of thing?” Would he want to fly?
“Nope. It’s pretty much dependant on your dreams.” Candy cocked her head. “So if you dream you’re a space cowboy, you might just end up a space cowboy.” She didn’t think he’d be a magic sort.
“Not sure I’d want that ... I mean. For one, this isn’t space.” Mal smiled faintly. “But at the same time, I think I’d like randomly flying less. I mean, can you control it?”
“I can control it.” She made a couple of careful gestures, then her feet went back down onto the ground. “Randomly flying would be awful.”
“Well, at least there’s that.” Mal laughed. He felt awkward asking, but now he was curious. “So ... can you like ... fly? I mean, long distances?”
“Yeah, I basically make a ship out of light.” She grinned. “Wanna go somewhere? I flew me and my husband to New Orleans to get married.”
“Oh.” Well, that made more sense than her just flapping her arms. “Yeah, I’m game.” Why not? It sounded amazing. “I just have to be back in time to feed Oscar.”
“I can take you to your place if you want, but hell you drove here. I’ll take you somewhere then back again, promise.” She walked over to the side of the diner, where there was a ladder to the roof. “Come on.”
“Okay.” Maybe he was crazy, but he was kind of excited. This was absolutely nuts. Mal climbed the ladder behind Candy, not entirely sure if he was going to get shot in the face once they got up there, but he’d always been kind of reckless.
Once they were both up top, she moved her hands and spoke some words, moving quietly and cautiously. Shimmering into being, a small hovercraft looking object came into being. “Where do you want to go?”
Mal blinked, eyes wide. “Holy shit.” How did it even move? It was hard to think that this was actually happening. “I ... wow.” Where could he even go? “Um. Maybe ... Phoenix?” He could see if his old club was still there.
“Sure, that’s not that far. I’ll have to go fast, though. Are you okay with that?” She grinned broadly, hopping into the glyph.