Mal had been approaching slowly. His legs almost felt possessed. He knew he was moving, but it didn't feel as if he was completely acting on his own free will. Why had it been so easy to accept Wash's return from the dead? Wash's demise had been in front of his own eyes and far more sudden than Book's. Wash's death was just as much Mal's fault, wasn't it? He was the captain and therefore responsible for his crew. But he'd laid out the danger of the Miranda mission, everyone had accepted it.
Book had been a bystander. His friendship with Serenity's captain had been used again them. Haven had been destroyed in the burning of the ground, as the Operative put it.
The soles of his boots stopped their scuffing step a few feet away from the preacher and the Amazon as they settled down on the curb. He had no plans of taking a shot at him like Zoe had upon seeing Wash alive; well, not a shot with a gun nor a fist.
Just a shot of the truth as he and Zoe knew it.
"She ain't seen you for some time, 'cause before we blinked out of sky and onto this gorram rock -- you were dead." It was a fine 'hi-how-are-ya from the startled and slightly disturbed Captain, but it was the best he could manage. Mal didn't always shine when his emotions were pushing things across the borders into awkward and uncomfortable. "But this place seems to have a way of remedy'n that."