20% more creative.

“I say unto you: one must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star. I say unto you: you still have chaos in yourselves.

They were outnumbered six to one and he prepared to die.

It wasn’t a grim thought. Death was death and if you died honorably (as they were about to do) then the world was made right. There was no shame in this kind of death at all. Dylan was shouting commands.

“What’d you call these guys again?”

“What guys?” More gunfire. Rhade picked the enemy out at random-it had-it was once a woman maybe with spikes in her ears and her nose and her throat and she was still screaming curses and obscenities. She’d been mutilated all thought and space and time.

“Aiya! Huaile-Mal, we have a serious problem. They’re multiplying.”

“What the hell are they?” Beka picked out one, two, three, “They’re-“

“Magog.” He found his voice, “…Magog-some kind of horrible.”

“This is no way of life for them.”

Halfway through their trip through the station they’d found five. There was magic in the number seven amid the angry boxes and the tossed apart world they needed magic. Rhade lifted his own gun and slid in beside her, “What?”

“This is no way of life. They’re not born. They’re made.”

She stared at him and the world stopped, “Not everyone likes them. They’re boo-tai jung-tzahng-duh-”

“River!” Their captain- (He and Dylan had been saying things the whole trip.) “Might be you could do something?”

“Something.” Dylan leaned back and shot another look at Rhade and then looked to the girl, “…No, no no-Rhade-” He rose, “Rhade-get up here and-” A blast echoed throughout the ship and Dylan was down.

His heart jumped into his throat and the girl was on her feet. She looked at him and smiled.

“Simon!” Malcolm Reynolds was by his counterpart’s side, “Simon, we need your bag and River-I hate to ask you this…”

River didn’t look to him. Her eyes were only for the second in command of the Andromeda staring blankly. One second, one heartbeat.

“You know why I’m really dangerous.”

Her tone was very matter of fact and she turn and spun out toward the dance floor.

——

It was a dance floor.

A dance like nothing he had ever seen. There were prides that bred for speed, prides that bred for beauty but nothing, nothing like this. He thought he heard music.

Then he realized, there was music playing, Harper’s voice was sharp,

“Harper.”

Dylan was watching, “Shut. up.”

The music made it surreal. One kick, one punch, the ground shook and the girl was on her feet and twisting and dancing.

Life is a dance. Death is leaving the dance, taking a step aside into something else. The heart of all things is movement.

“She’s-“

“She’s a dancer.” The Doctor had Dylan’s short down to the navel and was bandaging him up, “She was always a dancer.”

“She’s-”

“Quiet.” Beka was the one hushing them now, “I want to watch.”

The girl’s movements ebbed and flowed to the music. She took her cue from Harper’s dumb move and twisted and spun and raised her hands. This was no dance, this was the world flowing through the room-pitching and rolling like a-

“River!”

River bowed and everyone with a gun (Rhade found himself on his feet) stood up and fired, in the hollowed ship their shots sounded like applause.

———-

“…What did she ask you?” Dylan was limping, back onto their ship with the crew of the Serenity in tow, “The girl.”

“She didn’t ask me anything.” He lowered his head, “She said-“

“…Nothing should be able to give life and take it away. If it does it deserves, no requires respect.”

The two men looked up sharply to the small figure slim against the stars, “But I just dance.”

“I think you understand that better then most people. To truly become das ubermensch or das uberenfrau. Man must have chaos within themselves to give birth to a dancing star.”

Dylan felt like he was missing something very very important, “…And you’re…”

“I’m the dancing star.”

Rhade opened his mouth to reply and she was gone like a shadow and a shade. The two men stared after her.

“She was one hell of a dancer.”

“She was certainly something.”

For maximum impact listen to this song