"So, you and the cap'n are fightin' again?" Sir Anderson glanced at the young pilot. He had just come to the bridge to stretch his legs, and really wasn't looking for a conversation. "Yes, I suppose we are." "Why?" He sighed. "I don't know. I probably shouldn't have called her a criminal, however." "Yeah, we criminals tend not to like that." Sir Anderson glared at Mona. "How you can manage to be flippant at a time like this is beyond me." Mona rolled her eyes. This guy needed to lighten up; he was almost as bad as Saul. "So, Andy…" The nobleman's head snapped around, a horrified look on his face. "My name is Sir Anderson Chen. You should learn how to address your elders properly, Miss Ramona." The pilot twitched. "It's Mona. Only my father calls me Ramona." "Well then, you understand how I feel." Mona sighed and nodded. "Perfectly." "I think I'll head back to my quarters." "All right. See you later, Andy." Sir Anderson shivered and stepped off the bridge. This was the reason he had never reproduced. "I look forward to it, Ramona." As he went down the corridor, Sir Anderson could hear the pilot's muttered Chinese curses echoing down the hall, and a faint smile passed over his lips. When Rachel opened her eyes, she thought she was blindfolded. But she didn't feel the blindfold. It was just very dark. She tried to move her hands—they were zip-tied. "Dex?" A low groan drifted up from her left, then a shuffling sound. He was just regaining consciousness. "Rachel? What's going on, what are you doing in my quarters?" Rachel shook her head. She loved the man like a brother, but, Buddha help him, he just couldn't hold his chloroform. "Leo, you in here?" "Over here. They drug you too?" "Yeah, with a handgun. Your arms tied?" "Yeah. Been tryin' to break out since I woke up." Rachel sighed. "You know, I am gettin' real tired of people takin' advantage of my kind and generous nature." "You think the distress call was a plant?" said the vague outline to her left that was probably Dex. "I don't know. We just gotta figure a way out of here befor…" Rachel squinted as light flooded the room, which she now saw was a storage closet. Dex and Leo looked unharmed, but the man standing in the open doorway was probably looking to change that. "Which one o' y'all's in charge?" Rachel immediately tried to lift herself to her feet. "I'm Captain Rachel Wu of the Firefly Artemis, now what the can chen shu ju…" The breath escaped from Rachel's body as the massive man kicked her back against the wall. "Bi zuie, biao zi. You thank I'm stupid?" He looked around at the possible choices and decided that the dignified-looking man in black was the one she had been covering for. He hoisted Leo by his collar. "Come on." Before Rachel could protest, the sasquatch yanked Leo outside and slammed the door—she and Dex were plunged back into darkness. "What the hell was that?" "Guess he thought you couldn't be in charge 'cause you're a girl." "You know, that usually works to my advantage." She could feel Dex pressing against her back, trying to help her up from the wall. With a grunt, she managed to stand up again, but her gut was killing her. "Think the doc can take whatever they're gonna do?" "Don't think anyone could. We have to get out of here." Rachel wracked her brain for a moment, then a flash hit her; her hair was still up. "Dex, they didn't take my hairpin." "So?" "So it's a knife." "You keep a knife in your hair?" "Yeah, 's somethin' wrong with that?" "No, I just…how did I not know that?" "S'posed to be a surprise. Think you can get it?" Rachel felt Dex's hands touch her back and begin to move up. Eventually, they got to her head, and began flexing around for the hairpin. "Up more." "All right, got it." A moment later she heard a snap. "Okay, I'm out. Give me your hands." She spun her hands in the direction she thought Dex was and felt a light poke into her palm. "Ow!" "Sorry, sorry." Rachel felt the tie fall away and pulled her hands apart. Dex cleared his throat and passed her the knife as safely as possible in total darkness. "Now what?" Leo looked up at the leader of the ragtag crew standing over him, grinning. It wasn't the man from the transmission, and they certainly didn't seem like the types Unified Reclamation would employ, even out here. "Who are you people?" The haphazardly-shaven leader crossed his arms. "You first. 'Less you want us to call that pretty Firefly o' yours and tell 'em we just killed their captain." "I'm not the captain, I'm the doctor, you idiot. Your ju ren qu dan shi wei xing nao friend couldn't tell us apart." The pirate captain glanced up at the giant man, Hector. He shrugged. "All right, Penny, get t'others out here." Dex was on the far side of the door as it began to open, and Rachel was flattened against the side closer to the opening. Rachel's arm snaked out as the small redheaded woman entered, pressing the knife expertly against her throat. Dex rushed in, relieving her of her gun, and Rachel pushed her back into the cell, sealing the door behind them as they left. "All right, first thing we gotta find our radios and get Saul over here." "I don't see 'em. They musta took our stuff with 'em." Rachel sighed and nodded. Dex tossed her the gun, and they took the last corner onto the bridge just as the captain began to inquire what was taking Penny so long. The rest of his crew had their guns out before Dex cleared the corner, but it was obvious to everyone that Rachel would have had the first shot, and she intended to use it. The pirate captain smiled wanly as she leveled the gun at his head. "See, this is exactly what I didn't want. Now we got a sit'ation to resolve." Leo crawled over to the group and, as Dex cut his bindings, Rachel fingered the trigger threateningly. "Who the hell are you?" The other captain shrugged. "Just folk, like yourself. Got a distress call, came lookin' 'bout twenty minutes 'fore you did. Thought there might be somethin' we needed." Rachel's nose wrinkled in disgust. "You're vultures." "You ain't got no right to talk, girl. You're here same as us." "We came to help these people." A few of the crew chuckled. "Yeah, well, they're pretty well beyond that." "Saw to that yourselves, did you?" "Gotta tie up your loose ends, girl." "Yeah, well we're tyin' ours back to our ship, you got no objections." The captain spread his hands. "No, not at all. Always do what keeps me from bein' shot." Rachel smiled bitterly and retreated back down the corridor, keeping the gun on the captain until he disappeared around the corner. As soon as they were gone, the captain leaned over to Hector and deVille. "You boys take the other corridor, kill 'em 'fore they get home." Almost as an afterthought, he grabbed Hector by the arm. "Try 'n keep the girl alive. Think I could find a use for 'er." The big man flashed a menacing grin. Rachel was practically running. Given what she'd seen, she had some doubts as to the quality of the good captain's word. She spared a glance back at Leo. "Excitin' enough for ya?" Leo barely had a chance to laugh and shake his head before he saw the huge pirate round the corner and level a sub-machine gun. "Down!" Dex rolled around the corner of the T-shaped corridor as Hector opened fire. Saul's ears perked up and he resettled the barbell. That was definitely gunfire. Mona looked back as the cook's image filled the door to the bridge. "Heard shots. You gettin' anything on their radios?" Mona glanced at the console. "No, nothin'." Saul nodded solemnly. "All right, I'm gonna go check it out." Mona nodded, then turned back to the communications panel just as it began to beep. "Saul…" Mona pressed the display button. "This is Alliance Patrol Cruiser IAV Xian Cheng, responding to a distress call. All docked vessels stand down and prepare to be boarded." Mona looked up for his reaction, but Saul wasn't listening. His attention was fixed on the green-and-gray city ship that suddenly filled the cockpit glass. "Never mind."