If looks were lethal, Jenna decided, she might have been
spaced twice today. Avon's smoldering might have done it earlier
this morning. Just now, Blake's more temperamental pique posed the
threat anew.

He'd had to wait until they'd cleared Cygnus Alpha's system.
But with Cygnus' dust still powdering his boots and shredded tunic,
Blake had stalked across the flight deck to her piloting station
and planted broad hands on either side of the console.

"Now," he breathed. "Maybe you'd better explain it again."

Jenna demurred for the moment, letting him steam while she
watched the only beneficiaries of his rescue effort explore
Liberator's flight deck. Gan and Vila's timid delight at the alien
ship's wonders reminded her of her own first day aboard. No one
had commented on Avon's conspicuous absence. Just as well.

"I need an answer, Jenna." Measured calm in Blake's voice
now, but he still seethed beneath it.

Finally matching his glare, Jenna fired her own return salvo.
Naked truth, in her experience, was often an effective weapon.
"He tried to kill you," she said.

"Did he?" No belief whatsoever in the question; merely a
skeptic's distrust of her motives. Did the fool think she'd have
run out on him?

"Yes, he did!" she answered his query vehemently. Damn you
for the fool Avon says you are! Why can't you see? "He was going
to steal the ship and leave you down there."

"And you stopped him."

"Would you rather I hadn't?" she flared. "I've no particular
objection to being rich, you know -- only to the idea of killing
someone in order to get it. Avon isn't so discriminating."

She noted the relief in his eyes at her use of the present
tense. So, he'd also assumed her capable of killing an adversary
hand-to-hand, had he? A suspicious sort, this Blake, for all that
he was also blatantly naive. Jenna glanced at Gan and Vila, who
stood on the sidelines near the hexagonal gangway and murmured to
each other in low tones.

"All right, Jenna." That was Blake's 'patient' voice; Blake
the diplomat, Blake the mediator. "Where is he?"

The pilot rebuffed him with her eyes. At the same time, she
coaxed the palm-sized gun from its hiding place beneath her belt --
the gun she'd found in ship's stores the day after they'd boarded
Liberator. She proffered it end first to a startled Blake and
said, "Here. You'll need that, if you intend cutting him loose."

Awe crept into Blake's expression. Vila nudged Gan and
grinned cheekily.

"He really meant to do it?" Blake marveled, accepting the gun
with undisguised loathing. "He would have left us down there?"

"You haven't wanted to hear me, have you?" Had the man been
this naive before the Federation had rearranged his memory? "In
case it's escaped your notice in the past few months, Avon isn't
playing your game. Trusting him is like putting your hand in a
serpent's den -- you may survive the first few times, but it'll get
you killed eventually. You can't--"

Blake raised a hand, quelling her outburst. "Where?" he
repeated, a single, deadly-calm syllable. Jenna wanted to scream
at him, to unleash every smuggler's curse she'd ever learned and
invent a few besides. But she curbed the impulse, never allowing
it to show on her face, and squared her shoulders to confront him
as an undisputed equal. And I am, Blake. Don't ever forget it.

She waited several strategic moments before answering his demand.
"Hold seven," she said. He turned at once to go, and
exasperated, she called him back. "Blake!"

He spun, already on the entry steps, but Jenna's resolve
wilted under the continuing heat of his glare. "Nothing," she said
dismally. "Just be careful."

He went on his way without responding. After a long moment
spent listening to the soft vibration of Liberator's flight
systems, Jenna grew aware of eyes watching her, and looked up to
see Gan and Vila silently regarding her from the secondary
entryway. Both started at her look of scorn and feigned instant
disinterest, returning to their explorations of the flight deck.

Jenna dismissed them: her mind was on Blake and what he was likely
to find in hold seven.

Avon hadn't been seriously hurt, she was certain of that. But
she was equally convinced that he posed a serious danger to Blake -
- and to everyone else aboard. He had proven that to her himself,
in the teleport room an hour ago, when he'd stopped her from
reaching for the controls.

"We lose it all," he'd grated, forcefully restraining her arm.
"Jewels, currency -- all of it. What do you want to be, rich or
dead?" The urgency of the demand shocked Jenna no less than the
pain he inflicted on her wrist; both infuriated her.

"Let go of me." The warning held its own calm threat, but
Avon chose to ignore that.

"Don't be a fool, Jenna. We can have--"

"Jenna!" Blake's winded plea came over the speaker. "Jenna!
We need teleport!"

She fought Avon's grip in a fierce effort to reach the
controls, but he wrenched her arm back and dragged her bodily away
from the console, backing her to the wall. The move took her by
surprise: she hadn't expected him to push it this far.

"He could be dying down there--" she began.

"The better for us up here." The cold words were hissed in
her ear.

Over the open circuit, Blake's voice addressed someone on the
surface. "Go on, out there, anywhere. Hide among the rocks. I'm
going back in."

Jenna struggled harder to twist free of Avon's grip. "Let go
of me!"

He blocked her attempted kick with his body. Then,
maddeningly, he used the same agency to pin her still more firmly
against the wall and hold her there. In a single move, his attack
had gone from vengeful to seductive, though nothing but Jenna's
temper flared. "Damn you..."

"We don't need Blake." He was close enough to breathe each
word into her face. "We don't need anyone."

The kiss spoke more of brutality than passion, though Jenna
was no stranger to either. Freetrading had taught her more about
seduction -- and its potential use as a weapon -- than this dome-
bred Alpha byte-embezzler would ever know.

Deliberately, she forced her muscles to relax, to respond to
the pressure of his body against hers -- until the hands that
pinioned her arms to the wall released them. That small freedom,
fostered by his overconfident arrogance, was just enough to allow
her to reach the gun...

Her angle was poor, but the charge grazed his lower ribs with
enough force to throw him backward and away from her. With a
startled cry, he struck the teleport housing and went down.

Wasting no more time, Jenna sprang at the console and threw the
communications toggle.

"Blake! Are you still there? Come in, Blake!"

She cursed at the lifeless static that answered. She was too
late -- that or perhaps Blake was running and couldn't respond.
He'd said something about going back...

On the deck at her feet, Avon stirred, and Jenna struggled
with a brief moral dilemma. Her former compatriots, without
hesitation, would have airlocked Avon and had done with it. Her
only other alternative: confine him until Blake was safely back
aboard. She chose the latter purely out of practicality. The hold
was closer than the airlock.

Rattling the useless comm switch several more times, she
muttered a piratical oath impugning four generations of Avon's
ancestry. Then, the gun clipped within easy reach on her belt, she
bent to the task of dragging the semi-conscious man toward the
cargo hold.

Blake spun the hatch wheel to open hold seven, feeling utterly
foolish clutching Jenna's gun. Just the same, he kept a firm grip
on it as the heavy door swung outward, allowing him to peer into
the bay.

The sight of habitually proud and arrogant Avon shackled to a
support strut took Blake by surprise. The dark head came up when
he entered; glacial eyes regarded the gun with wary detachment.

The man's bitter comment disconcerted Blake still further.
"Did you come to finish the job?"

Blake peered down at him with open dismay, finally tucking the
weapon noncommitally into his wide belt. "Hardly," he said, and
crossed his arms to take up an authoritative stance in the
doorframe. "Is it true?" Neither of them saw need to identify the
subject of his query.

A sardonic smile teased the corners of Avon's mouth. "Would
you believe me if I were to deny it?"

Weighing that for a moment, Blake decided on candor. "No."

Incredibly, Avon climbed to his feet then, the 'bound' hands
coming around to reveal an opened pair of wrist cuffs. "Then I
won't," he said, and with a cavalier gesture, tossed the bonds to
the deck near Blake's feet.

The overt defiance of the action nettled Blake, as it had no
doubt been designed to do. "Why?" he demanded tersely.

Avon's teeth bared themselves in a half-grimace, and he leaned
casually against the strut. "It seemed a good idea... at the time."

Blake did not miss the hand that strayed surreptitiously to Avon's
rib cage. Perhaps, he mused, they would all think twice before
underestimating Jenna again.

Footfalls sounded in the corridor. Blake stepped aside to
admit the blonde pilot, who entered the hold closely followed by
Gan and Vila. All wore sidearms from Liberator's flight deck.

"If I'd needed help," Blake complained, irritated, "I'd have
called for it."

Vila, with Cygnus dust still smudging his cheeks, grinned at
Blake and quipped, "Maybe you just didn't know you needed it." He
patted the holstered gun with uncharacteristic bravado..

Jenna ignored the thief's boast, preferring to exchange heated
glares with Avon. When she turned to Blake, the light in her eyes
was decidedly predatory.

"I know someone on Tardek," she said, all-business. "You
could call her a 'broker,' of sorts. She'd take this one off our
hands, maybe even pay up to half the Federation's bounty -- if I do
the bargaining."

Astonishment, quickly masked, betrayed itself in Avon's
expression. Blake had to clamp his own dismayed response at the
smuggler's callous proposal, however suitable to the crime it might
be. "Honor among thieves?" he queried softly.

Jenna bristled. "Professional courtesy's more like it."

"I told you," Vila said with a nervous glance at Avon. "In
the beginning, on the London. We should have killed him when we
had the chance."

"You're brave as ever." Gan had finally found a voice, and
used it to chide his friend. "When there are enough guns around to
back you up, that is."

A persistent Jenna overrode the comment. "My friend won't ask
any awkward questions. She owes me a rather large favor. And
there's--"

Blake quelled her with a curt gesture. He had been watching
Avon's face throughout the proceedings, certain that despite the
detached mask, he had seen arrogance give way to uncertainty, and
pride to something he could only have guessed might be fear.

Somehow it was reassuring to know that even Avon had his Achilles
heel. He steeled himself to meet the computer tech's gaze head-on.
"All right, Avon. Suppose you tell us what we're to do with
you?"

The black eyes snapped at him, but for the first time in
Blake's experience, Kerr Avon was without an answer.
Blake wished the same could be said for the rest of his crew.

"We could maroon him," Vila suggested, "on a neutral planet
somewhere. Saves us the risk of trusting a bounty hunter."

"Broker," Jenna corrected.

"Marooning's no good anyway," Gan put in, concern edging his
soft voice. "He'd never survive an uncivilized planet, and on a
populated one he'd be recognized."

Vila snorted. "There are neutral planets."

"The price on our heads is a million apiece, Vila," Blake
reminded him acridly. "Nobody's that neutral."

Gan had apparently not finished rebuking the thief, either.
"Anyway," he said, "it seems to me you're awfully anxious to
condemn the man without a trial."

Vila's scowl spoke volumes. "Better than he wanted to give
us," he grumbled. "This is all the trial he deserves."

At that, Avon's disdain reasserted itself at last. "Very
impressive," he snarled at Blake. "Is this your idea of exemplary
crew? Prison rabble's finest?"

Jenna glared at him. "I didn't hear you denying the charges.
You'd do anything to take this ship -- anything at all."

Blake had the odd sensation that Avon's next words were a
recitation; something, perhaps, that he had said to Jenna earlier?

"I have to get rid of Blake first," he sneered. "You're next on my
list."

"Well, then again," Vila quipped acidly, "there's always the
old reliable stroll out the airlock, eh?"

Gan didn't appreciate the morbid levity. "Shut up, Vila."

"Sounds like a workable solution to me," Jenna said. "Either
way, he's off the ship."

Blake permitted the quibbling to go on, watching Avon all the
while. Though the man had adopted his customary air of
disdain, the fear and uncertainty lingered. Blake was sure he
could still see it, behind the aloofness, under the facade. But
then, he chided himself, he had also been sure from the beginning
that Avon's loyalty lay with the rebellion. Perhaps he had been
wrong -- both times.

"I won't be party to a murder," Gan objected, and Vila snapped
back almost immediately.

"You don't have to look then, do you?"

"Rehback IV has a city large enough to lose him in," Jenna
offered in a helpful monotone. "So does Vasartil, and Hydrenian."

Avon's own glacial pronouncement finally put paid to the
argument. He turned his glare on Jenna and growled, "I don't
intend to go anywhere."

She answered with one hand on the hilt of her gun. "Don't
imagine we'll give you a choice."

"All right, that's enough." Blake's intervention came more
from expedience than any need to defend Avon. He drew a long breath
before proceeding. "I think we'd do far better agreeing to help
each other. I need your help, Avon -- and like it or not, you need
mine."

Though the angry eyes narrowed, Avon made no effort to
contradict him.

Jenna's temper, however, snapped. "Don't be an ass, Blake.
You can't trust him not to--"

He cut her off, though his words were directed at Avon. "Oh,
but I can. Because Liberator offers the one thing he needs most
just now. Safety. In fact, it's the only safe place he can hide."

"Trouble is," Vila interjected, "he can do that without any of
us along."

"Yes," Blake agreed grimly. "Well, that effort's already
failed once. So now, Avon, it's either work with us, or..." The
implicit threat hit home -- the ice in Avon's eyes became a
blizzard.

"Are you crazy?" Vila demanded. "How can you believe--"

"I'll settle for his word," Blake said.

Avon's smile was even colder than his eyes. "It could be," he
said to Blake, "that you trust too much."

The rebel leader shrugged. "Perhaps."

"It will kill you one day."

The gauntlet thrown, Blake took an intimidating step forward.

"I'll still have your word," he said.

It was the final swordstroke, checkmate to the game. Blake
silently congratulated himself for a trap well-drawn as he watched
defeat overtake Avon's wrath. The dark head turned away for a
moment, then Avon drew himself up and conceded with bad grace.

"All right," he rasped. "But don't imagine I will ever be one
of your fawning 'faithful,' Blake."

"Good faith is as much as I'll ask," Blake retorted. "Our
safety for yours. You'll find it a very... equitable...
arrangement."

Apparently, Jenna saw no equity in the situation. She pushed
past Blake and stalked out the door, closely followed by Gan and a
smirking Vila. The thief turned back to deliver a grim parting
shot. "Still think we'd do better to deep-six him," he said, and
was gone.

Avon's shuttered expression seemed, ironically, to say that
Vila was probably right.

Jenna found both comfort and strength in the soft throbbing of
Liberator's flight instrumentation. For the past three hours of
solitary night watch, she had allowed the gentle rhythms to assuage
her anger and smooth her simmering temper. It had worked. Well,
nearly.

When she heard someone approaching the flight deck, she
mentally rehearsed the calmer, more rational arguments she would
use to persuade Blake of his folly.

But the visitor was not Blake.

She knew without turning: the footsteps were far too soft and
measured for Blake, too light to be Gan, and not stealthy enough
for Vila. When they ceased at the entryway, as though awaiting an
acknowledgment, she kept her back turned and said, "Come for the
next one on your list, Avon?"

The feet sauntered down the short flight of steps then, and
Avon strode past her, feigning no surprise whatever at her
discernment. He went forward to Zen's sensor housing, picked up a
tool and proceeded to tinker with something on the analyzer
console.

"Ignoring me won't help you," she told him bluntly. "I don't
intend going anywhere, either."

Even from this angle, she could see his lip curl. "We shall
see about that," he said.

Bluff for bluff, Jenna thought. He's cool enough, for someone
who damn near got himself spaced. Although cool, she reflected,
was too weak an assessment. She'd seen warmer smiles on Arcan ice
dactyls.

"Where's Blake?" Her query garnered an innocent look -- oddly
incongruous on Avon's face.

"Orientating the rabble, I should imagine."

"Good. He won't need to hear what I have to say."

Avon's tool ceased its probing, waited.

"It's Blake's ship," she said, leaving no room for argument.
"I won't let you take it."

Challenge glittered in the onyx eyes. "You can stop me, can
you?"

"If I have to." He seemed suddenly to have forgotten that she
already had stopped him, once. Well, if he needed reminding...

"Try it again," she warned, "and you'll have more than a few
singed ribs. That's a promise, Avon."

For a prolonged moment, they faced off across the barrier of
the piloting console. Then Avon's smile reasserted itself with a
'charm' that left Jenna utterly cold.

"Sooner or later," he said, and the humorless grin broadened,
"I will have my chance."

Jenna's look said, I'll see you in hell first. But she let
the boast pass, confident that her own point had been securely
driven home. "You take the watch," she said abruptly. For
emphasis, she adjusted a non-functional control as she rose. "I'm
tired."

The look he aimed at her was both querulous and calculating.
What was she up to?

Jenna let him wonder. She strolled with a deliberately casual air
off the flight deck and down the hexagonal corridor toward her
quarters.

There would be another time.