About eight months after River and Simon have joined "Serenity's" crew, the ship's captain Malcolm "Mal" Reynolds takes River with him to rob a bank. While they are robbing the bank, Reavers attack. After they escape back to "Serenity", Simon argues with Mal. Mal decides to leave Simon and River at their next stop. While at their next stop, River starts a fight that is started by a subliminal message broadcast by the Alliance in a commercial. Mal lets Simon and River keep traveling on "Serenity" while the crew talks to a techno-geek known as Mr. Universe. Mr. Universe lives on a planet inside a giant cloud of objects in space that does not let people see there is a planet there. Mr. Universe watches a video of the fight and finds the subliminal message. He also sees that River said the name "Miranda." Mal gets a call from Inara, a former passenger. He knows it is a trap, but also knows that she must be in danger. Mal goes to her. He is confronted by the Operative. The Operative tells Mal that he will let him go if Mal turns River over to him. Mal refuses and they escape from the Operative and go back to "Serenity". The crew finds out that "Miranda" is an unknown planet near the edge of the solar system. To get to Miranda, they would have to cross into Reaver territory. They think this is too dangerous. "Serenity" instead goes to Haven which is home to another former passenger, Shepherd Book. When they get to Haven, the crew sees that it has been attacked by the Alliance. They also see that Shepherd Book was hurt very bad and dying. The Operative sends a message saying he did it. He said he will keep doing things like it until River is given to him.