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The Price of Silence
Sheila Paulson
originally published in Errantry 1
Avon awoke with a stabbing pain in his throat and a dull ache in his head. For a moment, he could not remember where he was or what had happened to him. He was reluctant to open his eyes, but when he forced himself to do so, he saw the sterile walls of the experimental laboratory and everything came back to him.
For the past four days, he had been a prisoner in this room, never taken to a cell because the remote Federation base on Molina did not boast a cell block. Besides, the lab was the domain of his interrogator, Dr. Kordis, a bitter and brilliant scientist who was determined to break his prisoner before the Federation ships could come to take him back to Space Command Headquarters. It would be a feather in his cap if he were to do so, and Kordis was nothing if not ambitious. But Avon was different from the usual prisoners who came his way for questioning, and Avon didn't break. At least he could not remember breaking.
"Aha, awake, I see." Kordis appeared beside Avon's bed and looked down at him with a combination of contempt and pity. Avon had seen many things in the face of his interrogator in the past four days, but pity was a change. Either it meant that something new--and very unpleasant--was about to happen to him, or that it already had.
"What--" Avon started to say something, but he never completed the sentence. As he tried to speak, pain tore through his throat and absolutely no sound emerged. He tried again, clearing his throat, though it caused incredible agony, then desperately tried to frame words. Nothing happened except that it hurt, and Kordis looked gratified as well as pitying.
Avon's lips shaped the word, "Why?" It was as close as he could come to speaking, and he had to know what had been done to him.
Kordis smiled, the kind of smile that can be turned on and off at will. "Why, my dear fellow," he said in that falsely heart y manner that had annoyed Avon from the very beginning, "you have refused to talk all along. I have simply made that condition permanent. You would not talk, so now you cannot talk. Poetic justice."
Avon longed to remind the man that Servalan would want h im able to talk when he was taken before her for further interrogation. Knowing that, and knowing that Kordis would realize it too, he could only hope that the condition was not permanent and that Kordis was lying when he said it was. But Avon could not p ermit himself to believe it to be so. Though Avon's face hardened into an expressionless mask, Kordis seemed to know how Avon really felt.
"A bit of a shock, is it not?" he asked. "I've paralyzed the speech functions of your vocal cords, you see; made speech impossible. You might wonder if the process is permanent. I don't know; I've never been able to reverse it." He bared his teeth in another false smile. "But then with dissidents, it doesn't really matter, does it? Traitors to the Federation deserve no consideration." He laughed, and it was even worse than his smiles. "I'll leave you now to think things over. Perhaps when I return, we can talk about written statements."
He left the room without turning back, and Avon lay back on his bed and thought. There was no way to tell if Kordis was lying or not. He could not speak now, but that did not mean the condition was permanent. Kordis could be trying to scare him and, privately, Avon admitted that the doctor had done that well. Not that it mattered. He wasn't going to break, not here. Kordis did not have the proper equipment for that. Even if he had, Avon had been through Federation interrogation before; he knew a few tricks.
But it seemed that Kordis had a few tricks of his own. Avon hadn't planned on something like this. He had been certain that he could hold out until the Liberator returned to Molina. But the Liberator had not come back.
It had begun as a simple raid to blow up the communications center on the planet. Molina was remote, but it was a link in the communications relay, and as such its damage or destruction would hurt the Federation. Avon, Cally, and Vila had teleported down, not really expecting much trouble. But, unexpected1y, Federation pursuit ships arrived on routine patrol. Blake had called down to try to pull them out, but even as he did, troops arrived. Vila had been hit, and in trying to make his way to the thief, Avon had walked right into a relief patrol. He was captured immediately and his bracelet was removed. The last thing he remembered before waking up in Kordis's laboratory was the sight of Cally and Vila being teleported to safety.
At first, he had expected a rescue attempt, but there had been none. As time passed, he told himself that Blake had been forced to take the ship out of orbit, that he had the others and the Liberator to think about, and that he would return as soon as it could be managed. But as days passed and he did not return. Avon began to believe that they were not coming back. He told himself that if th e circumstances were reversed, he could have abandoned the others without a qualm, but they were more foolishly loyal than he had ever been, and they would be inclined to make heroic gestures in an attempt to rescue him. That they had not done so indicate d that perhaps the Liberator had been destroyed or at least damaged severely enough to prevent its return. After all this time, they might believe him dead or suspect that he had broken. He would have to accept the fact that they were not coming back.
#
He got up; they had never restrained him except when Kordis practiced his little experiments on him in an attempt to make him talk. He began to prowl around the lab, exploring, looking for something that might help him to escape. Everything of value ha d always been locked away, and perhaps he' might be able to manage some of the locks in time and with the proper equipment. But time was limited because someone might come in at any moment, and there was no equipment in sight. The only things that were not locked up were a shelf full of old-fashioned books. He had paid no attention to them before, but curiosity drove him to examine them now, that and the need to keep his mind occupied. Pulling one of them off the shelf, he opened it. It was very old, possibly pre-atomic, and he wondered how it had come to be in such a place as this. Under the circumstances, he found it a fruitless speculation.
He shoved the book back on the shelf and turned. Out of habit, with no real hope of success, he went around the room and tested the locks on all the cabinets. None of them had been opened before, but there was always a first time, and he wasn't going to pass up a chance simply because the effort might be futile. None of the drawers would open, no matter how hard he pulled on them, and he almost gave up right then. He pictured Kordis watching him on a monitor and smiling in that empty way of his as Avon grew more and more frustrated. But Avon had not been able to find a monitor in the room; maybe the base was too remote to have them. Or maybe it had never been felt necessary to plant one in the lab.
The last of the drawers was locked, and Avon turned away from it in frustration. There were still the rest of the cabinets to be checked, but he didn't really feel like bothering with them. They would be locked too, like always, and Kordis would enjoy his wasted effort.
He began to search the cabinets, trying to open the lower ones first, then the ones on the upper sections of the walls, cursing himself mentally for wasting hi s time this way. But there was nothing else he could do with his time except worry about his lack of speech and dwell on thoughts better left alone, so he continued.
And then, to his surprise, he found that the highest two cabinets yielded to his touch. The locking mechanism was intact, but the doors hadn't been pushed together tightly before it had been activated, and they sprung open now.
Avon dragged over a chair to stand on while he investigated the contents of the cabinets. Probably they would hold nothing more useful than files or lab equipment, but he could not pass up a chance. He began to search the crowded shelves. At first he did find files: records of equipment that had been bought for the lab, complete with cost breakdowns, and in one instance with a note from the director of the base attached, telling Kordis to cut expenses. Avon smiled to himself, imagining how Kordis must have felt about receiving something like that.
He shifted the file box so that he could see behind it, only to find more file boxes stacked away in neat, orderly rows. Avon was almost tempted to drag them out and fling them on the floor, leaving Kordis and his aides the task of organizing them again, but he restrained himself. Instead, he would search the boxes one by one, and maybe something useful would come to light. It wasn't until he was opening the last one that something did.
It was his teleport bracelet.
For a moment, he could hardly believe it; it must be a trick. But when he took it out of the box, he knew that it was real, and it looked undamaged. He put it on and pulled his sleeve down over it in case Kordis came back, then closed the doors carefully and returned the chair to its place. He couldn't request to be brought up, even if the Liberator w ere back on station, but he could signal. He hit the button and waited to see if anything would happen.
#
Cally had been waiting in the teleport section in case Avon managed to contact them. They had arrived at Molina only an hour ago. The Federation patrol had given them a lot of trouble, and damage to the Liberator had been severe enough to make it necessary to hide until repairs had progressed sufficiently for them to risk returning to Molina. Liberator was not quite up to full power yet, but Blake would wait no longer, and the others agreed with him. Vila's injury had not been serious; he was recovered now, and as Cally waited at the teleport, he kept popping in to see if there had been any news. When they had first arrived, they had tried to contact Avon, but without success. Now Blake was busy planning a rescue attempt, and Cally was waiting in case Avon had been unable to respond to their first signal and would try to call in.
Vila reappeared in the doorway. "Anything?" he asked.
"Not yet," she said. "Is Blake ready to go down?"
He shook his head. "Blake's being cautious this time," he replied. "He says that it won't do Avon any good if we're caught too, and he's right. It might be dangerous."
"We do not even know if Avon is still here. If they learned who he was, they might have sent him someplace else for questioning."
"Orac would have picked something up if they had," Vila objected. "They sent messages; we know that. But Blake thinks it's too soon for someone to have come for him."
At that moment, Avon's signal sounded. Cally and Vila looked at each other with a combination of hope and suspicion. "Avon, is that you?" Cally asked. Nothing.
She raised her eyes to Villa. "It could be a trick. We do know that he was caught."
"Maybe it's not safe for him to say anything," Vila said.
"And maybe it is someone else using his bracelet." She hit the comm switch. "Blake, I'm receiving a signal from Avon's bracelet, but there is no voice contact."
"Then don't teleport him until I get there. If it's not Avon, I want to be ready."
He arrived in the teleport section quickly, trailed by Jenna, and both of them were armed. "If it's not Avon, this will give us a better chance," he said. "And even if it is, we've got to face the fact that he has been a Federation prisoner for four days. It's unlikely, but they may have broken him. We won't know that until we talk to him, but we can't take any risks." He took out his gun. "All right, Cally. Teleport now."
#
Avon had been unexpectedly pleased to hear Cally's voice, but his inability to respond to her questions frustrated him. He wondered if she would teleport him without voice contact, and when nothing happened immediately, he went back to his bed and sat down wearily. He had not been treated well during his captivity, and he was weakened by fatigue. Without much expectation of any response, he signaled again.
And Cally said, "Teleporting now."
Avon had just enough time to climb to his feet before he found himself on the Liberator again. The others were staring at him in concern, and Blake and Jenna were lowering their weapons. At the sight of him, Blake jumped forward and took his arm. "Avon, you look terrible. Are you all right?"
Automatically, Avon tried to reply, to deny any need for help, but the pain struck again, and he could not speak. His face closed away from them, and he pulled his arm away.
They could not have failed to see the pain that he had been unable to conceal, nor the abortive attempt to speak. Vila and Cally exchanged nervous glances and Jenna gave him a doubtful look.
"Can't you tell us what his wrong?" Blake asked, his voice gentle.
Avon only looked at him helplessly and shook his head.
"Did they break you?" Blake asked in that same gentle tone.
Avon shook his head again. He didn't think that had done that.
"What then?"
"Blake," Cally said quickly, "I do not think that he is able to speak."
Blake turned back to Avon. "Is that it?" he asked. "Avon?"
Avon nodded reluctantly.
"They did something to you to prevent you from speaking?"
Avon inclined his head. Then the strain of the past four days caught up with him and the room began to spin before his eyes. He welcomed unconsciousness as a respite from the questions.
#
"Well?" Blake asked as Cally arrived on the flight deck. "How is he, Cally? Will he be all right?"
"He's asleep for the moment, Blake. They treated him a bit roughly down there, but I do not find any serious injuries. He should recover quickly."
"But why couldn't he speak, Cally?"
She looked at him helplessly. "I don't know. I can find nothing to cause it. There is a bit of swelling, but not enough even to cause hoarseness."
"Then why couldn't he talk?" Vila demanded, his concern poorly concealed. "You say there's nothing wrong, but <I>something</I> is."
"I don't know," she repeated.
"Was Avon conscious before you left?" Blake asked her.
"Not completely. He partially revived, and I reassured him that he was safe on the Liberator. He tried to comment, but he could not, and he wen t back to sleep." She shook her head. "No, I do not think he did. He closed his eyes and pretended sleep. I remained with him until I was certain he was sleeping, though. When he awakens, he should feel much better."
"But he indicated that they did something to keep him from being able to speak," Jenna reminded her.
"If they did," said Cally unhappily, "I cannot tell what it is."
"Some sort of conditioning then," Blake realized. "They had four days to work on him. They could have accomplished a lot in that time, even with Avon."
"Yes," Jenna agreed. "And they could have done more than that. He could be programmed to harm us or turn the Liberator over to the Federation."
"Perhaps, but I don't think so. If they've found a way to convince him that he could not speak, that could be a very effective interrogation tool; restore his voice later, and hope he would talk freely. But if he is to do something here, I think he would need his voice, if only to convince us that he was unhurt and that it was safe for u s to continue as before. After four days, they might have assumed we weren't coming back for him either."
"Is there any way we can be sure?" Vila sounded worried.
"Orac might help," Cally said. "But without knowing exactly what was done to him, even Orac might have a problem. I hope Avon will be able to tell us himself."
"How?" asked Vila. "If he can't say anything, how is he going to be able to tell us anything?"
"If there's no other way, he can write it," she said, but she had a feeling that Avon was n ot going to like any of this. He would hate being helpless in any way, and the thought of being dependent on the others would be galling to him. It wouldn't be easy.
#
And it wasn't. Avon awoke several hours later and found Vila waiting for him with a hot meal. They had not fed him very well on Molina, and he was hungry, but when he tried to speak to Vila about the food, he found that his voice had not returned.
The thief said, "Cally thought you'd be hungry. Here." He placed the tray beside Avon and made to leave in a hurry. Avon reached out and caught his arm to stop him. He needed information and Vila was the only one to give it. But how to ask questions? He motioned for Vila to speak, and Vila gave up on trying to get away and said, "Orac can't find any physical cause, Avon. He thinks it's either some form of hypnosis or programming. If it's hypnosis, it should wear off, but the programming might need to be removed."
Well, that was what Avon had expected. He motioned for Vila to continue.
"And, uh, Blake teleported down to try to find out what they'd done." Vila went on reluctantly. "He captured a guard and learned that it was a Dr. Kordis who had been working on you . Blake tried to bring him back up here." He stopped, looking even more uncomfortable. "And he was almost caught. There was a lot of shooting--and Kordis was killed."
Without Kordis, there was no way of telling what had been done to him. Ignoring the food , Avon slumped back on the bed, his expression forbidding. If he could have said anything right then, it would have been to order Vila to leave, and Vila knew it, but he looked determined to say something first.
"Avon, Orac's had a bright idea. Until we c an find out exactly what Kordis did. Orac has come up with a gadget that can help. It can translate attempts to talk into a sort of speech. It won't sound anything but mechanical. but at least you'll be able to yell at me if you want to. Blake and the others are working on it now. Orac has given them the specifications; it should be ready soon."
A mechanical voice? Avon considered that and found the idea repellent, but it was better than silence. As usual. Vila's explanation was inadequate, and Avon would have liked to tell him so, but there was no way to do it.
Vila plunged on. "They think it'll be ready in a couple of hours. Blake grabbed some of Kordis's notes too, but they're in some sort of code that even Orac can't break. We can't find the key to it. Orac says there isn't any consistency to it or any pattern. Do you want to have a go at it? Maybe you could make more sense from it than we could."
Undoubtedly. Avon tried automatically to say so and discovered that while no sound emerged, the pain was less than it had been right at first. Could it be wearing off? He tried to speak again, harder this time, and discovered that the pain was still there, lurking just below the borders of awareness. He closed himself away from it, and Vila pretended not to notice. That was even worse; Vila being sympathetic and letting it show, Vila being tactful, Vila avoiding sarcastic remarks. It was insupportable, and it wouldn't only be Vila who would change toward him. It might be better to leave the Liberator than to stay like this. He told himself that he had always meant to leave, but somehow it seemed harder to contemplate now. That made him angry at himself. Better to leave, he thought. Better to leave than to stay, the target of everyone's pity. He'd give it time, in case there was a solution, but if there were none, he would go. He could find that bolthole he'd always talked about; he knew of several possibilities already.
Vila's voice broke into Avon's thoughts. "We've had to leave orbit around Molina, but we got everything there that we could." Vila hesitated. "We got into a battle with some Federation ships before and they did a bit of damage, drained the power cells, too. That's why we were gone so long. We got back to you as fast as we could."
That recalled to Avon that Vila had been wounded, but when he looked at him, there seemed to be no trace of injury.
Vila, who was starting to show an uncanny ability to guess what he was thinking, said, "I wasn't hurt too badly back there. Still, it wasn't any fun, I can tell you, and everybody acted like it was nothing. They just don't understand pain. They wouldn't like being shot, either. I don't think I like going down to planets. Operating the teleport's more my style."
Avon gave him a scornful look, but he was discovering that coping with Vila was impossible without speech. Even worse, Vila now produced a pad and writing implement. "Is there anything else you want or need, Avon?" he asked tentatively.
Avon's first instinct was to fling them across the room, but he controlled it and took the pad. He wrote in answer to Vila's question, "Two things. Kordis's notes. Go away, Vila."
Vila read it over. "Right," he said. "I'll get them," and he went out in a hurry. Avon realized that it could not have been any easier for Vila than it had been for him, but that didn't help. Without speech, he simply could not deal with Vila properly. His sarcastic wit and biting tongue were part of his defense against people who might otherwise get too close to him, and without them, force d to depend on others to get along, Avon did not think he could manage. He'd give Orac's gadget a try, but he already knew he was going to hate it.
Jenna returned with the notes that Blake had managed to steal from Kordis. She held them out to him. "Vila s aid you wanted these. Shall I leave you in peace to study them?" At least she had the sense to ask a question that could be answered with a nod or a head shake.
Avon nodded and took the notes from her, becoming absorbed in them immediately. Jenna looked a t him a moment, then turned to go. She paused in the doorway. "By the way, Cally says there's no reason for you to stay in the medical unit any longer. You can return to your cabin if you'd like."
Avon nodded. He'd had no intention of staying in the medical unit anyway. He turned back to. the notes again as Jenna left.
#
The notes proved to be as incomprehensible to Avon as they had been to everyone else. He took them to his cabin to study them, but he found that, without a voice, he could not even use the intercom to request that someone bring Orac to him. Frustrated because he realized that even if he did have Orac he could not give it instructions, he flung the notes across the room; then, before anyone could come in and see what he had done, he retrieved them and set them aside.
#
When Blake arrived with "Orac's gadget," he came alone, and Avon, who was becoming touchier by the minute, found himself resenting Blake's tact almost as much as he resented the need for it. But he was curious. If this worked, it could make things easier.
"Vila said he told you about this," Blake said, holding out something that looked like a throat microphone. "I tested it on myself, and it does work. I have a feeling that you're not going to like it very much, but at least it will give us some options." When Avon didn't respond, Blake went on quickly to the basics. "What it does is to take the speech impulse and translate it into sound. What you need to do is go through the motions of speaking and this wi l l pick up the vibrations and amplify them, producing a facsimile of speech." He stepped forward to put it on, but Avon forestalled him, taking it from Blake and studying the device. It was mounted on a band that fastened around his throat. He put it on, a djusting it comfortably, and looked a brief question at Blake to make certain it was attached properly. Blake was watching expectantly, and Avon, who would have liked to make his first attempts with the device in complete privacy, was forced to try it in front of an audience instead. "All right," he said. The sound produced was blurry around the edges, indistinct as if he were very drunk. It also sounded mechanical and completely without inflection. Avon stiffened at the sound of it.
"I think it might be best if I left you to work on it on your own," Blake said, but Avon didn't care for that any better. He put out a hand to forestall Blake, and, making a deliberate attempt to clarify the sound, he asked, "Is there a technique to improve the sound quality?" This time he thought he sounded fractionally better.
"We don't know," Blake replied. "At least you're understandable. It seems to work better for you than it did for me, but Orac's design was based on you specifically. I know it will probably take some time and it will be tiring right at first, but it will help."
"You mean if the condition is permanent?" Avon asked. It took him a long time to frame each word, and he could see Blake resisting the temptation to step and complete the sentence for him.
"We don't know that it is," Blake said. "Do you remember exactly what he did to you, Avon?"
"No. I remember nothing about it."
"Well, you probably wouldn't in any case. Orac suspects it may be a form of hypnosis rather than programming."
"Kordis said he had paralyzed the speech functions of the vocal cords," Avon remembered. "However the vocal cords have other functions as well."
Blake found that it took a great deal of concentration to understand Avon. "That's true," he agreed, "which would, I think, mean that he had done nothing physical to you. Did he tell you if it could be reversed or not?"
"He said not."
"We1l, he'd say that in any case. They were questioning you; they wanted to break you. I should think that temporarily removing your ability to speak would be a good interrogation tool. For all they knew, they had plenty of time to work on you. Did they know who you were?"
Avon nodded. "They knew." He thought of something else then. "Blake, you must be careful. I found my bracelet right before you came back, under strange circumstances. My escape was too easy." He had to stop to catch his breath before he could continue. "You do not know what other conditioning might have been implemented."
"We've already considered that. We don't think there was time for anything else." He shrugged. "We don't know though. What do you suggest? That we have you watched?"
"No. Find me a bolthole."
"And just leave you? I don't like that idea very much, Avon."
"Am I a prisoner here?" The sarcasm that could not show in his voice was clearly visible on his face.
"Of course not. But I think it's too early yet to be giving up."
Avon gave him a look of cold fury. Things were bad enough already without Blake's apparently patronizing attitude, and if that were a sign of how th ings were to continue, the bolthole was starting to look more attractive all the time. But he didn't say so. Instead, he pretended fatigue and asked to be left alone. Blake went with obvious reluctance.
#
"How is he?" Cally asked when Blake returned to the flight deck.
"I'm not sure. The device works and I could understand him, but he sounded very different. I think he'll use it, but it's not easy for him." He frowned. "Another thing to consider is something we've mentioned before, the possibility t hat he may have been programmed to kill one or all of us. Avon, himself, recognizes that possibility--he says that his escape was too easy, and I'm inclined to agree with him about that, but we have no way of telling if he was programmed to harm us or the ship."
"So what do we do about it?" Vila asked nervously.
"Short of placing a guard on him, I don't see what we can do, and I don't like the idea of doing that. I think we ought to just wait. It might mean a bit of risk for us, but I don't think that Avon has been programmed to hurt us. They might have got round to that eventually, but I don't think they did, and I'm willing to gamble that I'm right."
"That's all very well for you to say," Vila said doubtfully.
"What do you suggest, Vila? That we lock him up on the off chance?"
"No, we can't do that either." Jenna said, "If he were going to do something, then he would have done it already, unless there was some trigger phrase that would initiate the program. And if that's the case, then one of us would need to say it, which would mean that someone would be there at the time. I think that if we stay alert, we could meet that kind of threat if it developed."
"What did Avon suggest?" Cally asked.
"That we find him a bolthole and leave him there."
"You mean just abandon him?"
"Vila, I don't think he liked making the suggestion any more than I liked hearing it. I don't plan to take him up on it." Blake frowned and added reluctantly, "At least not until I have proof that I must."
Nobody had a good answer to that.
#
Avon worked for several more hours on the coded notes that Blake had stolen from the base at Molina, coordinating his work with Orac and, when he was ready to stop for the night, he had reached the conclusion that either Dr. Kordis was a rare genius who had invented a totally unbreakable code, or else the pages were filled with nonsense. He was just tired enough to find the latter idea amusing.
The voice device did sound better with practice, and Avon realized that he was going to have to venture out among the crew before very much longer. He hated the idea of it and, because he hated it, he was determined to do it as soon as possible. It would be better to have the first bad moments over with and go on from there. If their reaction to that dreadful monotone voice was as bad as he expected it to be, he didn't want to put it off any longer than necessary. He did not want to see the pity that he was sure he would find in their eyes. Blake had concealed it fairly well, but his whole attitude had changed, and that made Avon uncomfortable. How Vila and Cally would react worried him--Vila had been unlike himself earlier, and Cally would not be very good at hiding her concern. It was going to be harder than he wanted to think about
#
In the morning, he presented himself on the flight deck at his usual time, his face guarded and impassive. Blake looked up and saw him. "Good morning, Avon," he said as if things were normal.
Things weren't normal, but it gave him something to work on. "I fail to see what is good about it," he returned. He had been practicing since he awoke, and he thought he had improved, but the strained silence that fell as soon as he spoke made him realize he had not improved enough. Blake managed not to react badly, but Cally cringed slightly before she could hide it, and Vila looked away.
Jenna, to his surprise, only gave him an interested glance and her comment was reassuringly matter of fact. "It sounds like it's working well, Avon. Congratulations. You should have heard Blake trying it out yesterday."
"Thank you for your vote of confidence." He had meant to sound sarcastic, but he had forgotten that there was no emotion in the mechanical voice, and Jenna appeared to take the comment at face value.
#
Vila was not really that upset by the mechanical voice. The meeting with Avon the previous day had been difficult, and he realized that, unless Avon could talk to him, their relationship was going to deteriorate in an alarming manner. Avon may have been nasty-tempered and difficult, but Vila had got used to that, and he was comfortable with it. It didn't matter to him so much that Avon didn't sound normal. What did matter was that Avon could fight back just like always, and he had turned away to hide his relief. Now as he looked over at Avon, he wondered if Avon had misjudged his response and he decided to find out.
"I should have known it was too good to be true," he said into the uncomfortable silence.
Avon's eyes came to rest on him suspiciously, but it was Blake who asked the question. "What was too good to be true?" He didn't sound like he wanted to hear the answer.
"I thought I finally wouldn't be yelled at and complained about and insulted, and now he's going to start up allover again. It's not fair. I always get picked on."
"Only because you deserve it, Vila," Avon told him, and while there was no trace of emotion in his voice, he looked slightly more at ease than he had before.
"I knew it," Vila went on. "And it's too much to hope that any of you lot will stick up for me. You never do."
"Perhaps they have too much taste for that, Vila," Avon said.
"Maybe they don't want to risk your nasty temper. They can see how you treat me and they know that the same thing would happen to them."
"No, Vila, I reserve it for those who deserve it most." He glanced over at Blake, who was grinning broadly, and then turned back to Vila. "I don't understand why they bother to put up with you at all," he said, and for once there was a trace of warmth in his eyes that belied his words.
Vila pretended to be affronted. "Avon," he said, "shut up."
Silence thudded down on the flight deck at his choice of words, and Blake exchanged an uncomfortable look with Jenna. Cally took a hasty step forward to intervene, but she was brought up short by a harsh, rasping sound from Avon. She turned to him quickly, then stopped dead, staring. Avon was laughing.
The tension snapped abruptly. For once, Vila had done the right thing, and it had worked. Avon turned to Vila. "Don't press your luck," he said, but Vila relaxed happily at his words and turned to Blake. "So what dangers have you got planned for us next?" he asked. Changing the subject seemed like an awfully good idea to him right about then.
"He's volunteering," Avon said. Vila looked horrified and began to protest at once, and the activity on the flight deck settled down.
#
Blake could still sense some tension in the air, and realized it would be there until things returned to normal for all of them. Until then, the best thing he could think of for everyone was to take some kind of action. He said so.
"Another blow for the glorious cause?" Avon retorted. "He's never at a loss, is he? Ready to sacrifice anything for the rebellion--or anyone."
Blake spun around and looked at him. The memory of Gan's death was too recent for him to take that comfortably, and what had just happened to Avon on Mo1ina didn't help. "I'm willing to discuss it," was all Blake said, but while he realized that Avon would have to be fee ling some bitterness over what had happened to him, he couldn't help being a bit hurt over Avon's choice of words. On the other hand, he was glad that Avon was able to speak them at all, unwelcome though they might be.
"Yes, let us discuss it." Now that Avon had started to speak, Blake wondered if there would be any way to stop him.
"I had in mind a quick raid," he said.
"That's what you said the last time," Vila protested, siding with Avon. "And it wasn't any fun for me or for Avon. I volunteer to mind the teleport."
Avon gave Vila a disgusted look. "Where?" he asked.
"Galliad."
"Are you mad, Blake?" Jenna objected. "That place is so well fortified we wouldn't stand a chance."
"I don't plan to blow the place up. But there is something I want there, an d I think we can make a quick run, in and out, before they spot us. We've got Avon's detector shield to keep us from being spotted until the last possible moment, and if we come in on the far side of the planet, we might manage to stay undetected until we 're ready to leave."
"But what's on Galliad?" Vila complained.
"A man called Angier."
"Never heard of him. Who is he?"
"The man who trained Kordis. I want to find out if he can do two things: either reverse the programming on Avon or read Kordis's notes."
Avon had gone curiously still at Blake's words. Before he could comment one way or another, Blake went on quickly, "We need to know, Avon. If there has been any other programming, we've got to find out about it. We can't simply wait and hope for the best. This is the best chance we have to put things right."
"How did you learn about Angier, Blake?" Cally asked him.
"Orac suggested him. He tapped into Federation records and learned where Kordis got his training. Angier was the best, maybe still is. I can't pass up the chance. What about the rest of you? Do you think it's worth going to Galliad?"
"Yes," Cally agreed promptly, and Jenna nodded. Blake turned to Vila, who said quickly, "Why not? I'm surprised I'm even being consulted."
"Avon?"
There was a long silence while Avon looked at him levelly. Then he nodded. "Very well. For me, the risk would not be excessive."
Considering some of Avon's previous comments on the subject of "acceptable risk," that statement gave them a pretty good idea of how he felt about the current state of affairs. Blake turned. "Zen, course to the planet Galliad, speed standard by six. Confirm with arrival time."
+Estimated arrival time 20.5 hours.+
#
The trip to Galliad seemed to take longer than Zen's estimate. In spite of Vila's earlier attempt to dispel the tension, it kept creeping back. Avon remained on the flight deck for several hours, giving an appearance of normalcy, but every time he spoke, he shattered that illusion. It was apparent that Cally was having trouble relating to the mechanical voice, and for all of Jenna's cool acceptance at first, she found the sound of it grating. Blake worried about it more for Avon's sake than anything else. He believed that if they could not come to terms with Avon's problem, and quickly, Avon would start thinking about the bolthole again and had probably never stopped thinking about it. He hoped that Angier would present a so1ution to the prob1em, but he would not allow himself to count on it.
With Avon's detector shield in operation, they managed to approach Galliad without being detected by any Federation pursuit ships. The base on Galliad was a scientific research station and medical facility; rumor had it that it was here t hat the Federation was experimenting with new types of suppressants to keep the populace in line, and that other experiments, germ warfare experiments, that had laid waste to several planetary populations had begun here. It was going to be a dangerous ope ration.
As they neared the planet, Avon sought out Blake on the flight deck. "I know you, Blake. You have more in mind than simply grabbing Angier, don't you?" Either he was becoming more proficient at the mechanical voice or Blake was getting used to it. He almost fancied he could hear Avon's usua1 suspicion lurking in it this time.
"What do you mean, Avon?"
"It is too much to expect that, once on Galliad, you will be satisfied with the kidnapping of one elderly scientist."
"Maybe not," Blake conceded. " I've been considering it, true. Some of the programs down there are entirely computer controlled. Orac has been tapping into them for a time now. I think we can do a lot of damage by ordering Orac to alter some of those programs."
"A short-range solution, Blake. They would only alter them back as soon as the fault was discovered. It might take time, but they should be able to eventually restore things."
"Yes. But while they are busy with that, we cou1d be doing other damage. Some explosives p1anted in strategic spots, for instance."
"And you have been wanting an excuse to come here. How fortunate for you that I have provided one."
Blake didn't need to hear any inflection in Avon's voice to interpret his feelings this time. "That's not the way it is, Avon ," he said. "Angier comes first. If we don't have a chance to do anything else, then we don't. But if we do get him without trouble, then we can go on to the rest."
Avon looked skeptical, and Blake couldn't quite blame him for that, but he only said, "Avon, you have my word on it. Angier comes first."
"As Kordis did?"
"That was unfortunate."
"Unfortunate? I like your choice of words. Without him, you have no way of knowing how safe you are. Blake, if this is as big a failure as Molina, you can leave me on the first reasonable planet that you come to, and that will be the end of it."
"I'm not ready to consider that yet."
"It is not your decision."
"No, I know it isn't. I hope you'll give us a better chance than that, though, just as we would give you one."
"We shall see," Avon replied and turned to leave.
Blake watched him go but did not try to call him back. There was nothing more to say.
#
Liberator managed to reach Galliad unchallenged and undetected. The space traffic was less than expected , and Blake wondered if the planet's reputation wasn't its major defense. There would have to be much more to it than that, of course, but it might not be quite as dangerous as they had anticipated. He turned toward the others.
"All right," he said. "Orac has been able to determine where we are most likely to find Dr. Angier, and we will teleport down directly to his office. It will mean a quick run-by, and we might be spotted, so as soon as we have teleported down, Liberator will withdraw. We'll take thirty minutes, then the Liberator will return and pull us out whether we have Angier or not. In the meantime, Orac will do its best to confuse the systems down there, so with luck they'll be busy on that and not looking for any other trouble. Avon, Vila, I want you both down there with me."
"Why me?" Vila asked in alarm.
"Because we might need you to open some doors for us. Don't argue about it. Cally will operate the teleport. Jenna, as soon as Cally reports us down and safe, take the Liberator out of range again."
"Right, Blake. Be careful."
#
Blake, Avon, and Vila materialized in an outer office that was fortunately empty. The door to the inner office stood open, and Blake approached it cautiously. Inside was a desk and a wall full of laboratory equipment. There was a man sitting at the desk reading a report on a computer terminal, but he glanced up at Blake and said, "Yes? Come in. Was I expecting you?" He was elderly and haggard-looking, far too thin, and apparently in ill health. The hand with which he switched off the screen trembled a little.
"Dr. Angier?" Blake asked.
"Yes. And you are...?"
"My name is Blake. These are Avon and Vila. We have business with you."
If Angier recognized their names, he gave no sign of it. "Come in, come in," he urged. "It's pleasant to have visitors. I think they ignore me as much as possible around here. Getting senile, you know. Or so they think," he added with a crafty look on his face. "Blake?" he repeated suddenly. "Not Roj Blake ?"
Avon's hand drifted toward his gun, but Angier was smiling broadly. "Welcome," he said. "Have you come to take me out of here? I'm ready, if you are."
"Is he saying he's a rebel?" Vila asked in surprise. That was something they had not expected.
"Why, of course I am," Angier said. "Not that anyone suspects. They only think that I'm past my usefulness, but they humor me because I'm still the best. Kordis thought to outshine me, but he is a fool."
"He is a dead fool," Avon informed him.
"Oh, dead, is he?" Angier asked with interest but without evident regret. "That is an interesting speech device you have there. I don't believe I've ever seen one quite like it. You wouldn't be willing to let me study it, would you?"
"More than willing, later," Blake replied. "Right now we've come because of Kordis. He was your pupil. He studied under you for some time according to our information. Would you be able to read his notes?"
"Kordis's notes? Oh, no, no, no. No one could ever read them. Some very obscure key t o them that kept changing all the time. He had total recall, you know. A photographic memory. Picked some page out of an old book and based it on that. Switched pages and books all the time, too. I know how it worked, more or less, but without the right p age or pages of the right book, I could not do a thing. No one ever read Kordis's notes. Not me, not even Servalan."
"Servalan?" echoed Vila nervously.
"She was interested in the code. Kordis wouldn't play along with her--so she had him assigned to some backwater planet to teach him that it does not pay to disagree with the Supreme Commander. Didn't kill him because he might be useful one day. Poor Kordis. Too ambitious for his own good. If his notes are what you've come about, you've wasted your time. Sorry, but I can't help you."
Avon's face went impassive, but Blake wasn't ready to give up yet. "Kordis has perfected a conditioning technique which makes a man believe he is unable to speak," he explained. "Are you familiar with this at all?"
"Yes, yes, o f course I am. I taught him everything he knew, I did." He looked over at Avon with interest. "So he played his little game with you, did he? And you fooled him with that speech device. Well done. But that's not why you're here, is it? You want me to reverse the programming. Nothing simpler, my boy. Nothing at all. Except..."
"Except?" Vila asked uneasily.
"They'll be here soon. Ten minutes, tops. They're going to retire me." He gave them a rather sickly smile. "I suspect they're going to kill me. No use to them anymore. I'll go with you happily--but we must leave now."
"At least twenty minutes before the Liberator is back on station, Blake," Avon reminded him.
"Then we'll hide. Angier, is there someplace we can go where we can stay hidden for twenty minutes?"
"Well, I don't know," the old man began slowly. "Twenty minutes? Know where you are, don't you? Galliad base is top security. Used your teleport to get here, didn't you? I've heard of it. Took some of us out of here to reinstate the Federation teleportation project. If you can do it, then the Federation people can do it too, don't you know." He chortled to himself. "Me, I hope it doesn't work. Federation's too powerful already." He got to his feet and reached for a cane. "All right. Come with me. You're now visiting scientists from Earth, should anyone ask. Let me tell it. They know me."
Avon and Blake exchanged a doubtful glance, but it did not look as if there were any choice. They could wait here and hope that the man was wrong, but if he wasn't then they'd be easy targets. On the other hand, if he were very cool and crafty, he could lead them right to base security and turn them in.
He saw their faces. "Oh, don't worry. I'm not going to turn you over to security. Wouldn't do that."
"Not even to get yourself reinstated?" Blake asked him.
"Wouldn't work. Federation would hardly keep me alive out of gratitude, now, would they? Here." He pulled open a door in the corner and took out three lab coats. "Put these on. Can't very well go walking around with your guns showing, and I doubt that you'd take them off, now, would you?"
The lab coats were Angier's and did not fit well, since he was so gaunt. Blake's wouldn't begin to fasten, so he left it open, and Avon and Vila followed his example. If nothing else, the coats did cover their guns, but they also made it hard to get at them, should they need to.
Blake gave Angier a teleport bracelet. "Put that on. You'll need it to teleport." He adjusted his coat. "Well, do you think we'll pass muster?"
"You'll have to do," Angier decided as he fastened the bracelet to his wrist. "Come along. Don't dawdle."
Avon gave him a disgusted look as they set off. Angier treated them to an extensive lecture on DNA as he led them through the corridors and instead of receiving suspicious looks from the people they passed, Blake and his party were viewed sympathetically. Angier was a boring lecturer.
"Here we are," he said at length. "My quarters."
"Your quarters!" Vila drew back in alarm. "But they'll search here first thing, won't they?"
"Yes, but it won't be as easy as they think." Angier led them across the room to a closet. Shoving several suits of clothing aside, he pushed a hidden button and the back of the closet s lid aside to reveal a smaller room. "They don't know about this. Found it by accident. Secret room. Somebody who had the room before I did was a bit paranoid." He gave them a smug look. "Hide in there."
"And you are going to hide with us," Avon told him, gripping the old man's arm and pulling him into the room with them. At that moment, all the alarms on the base went off. "Quickly," Angier urged, drawing deeper into the hidden room and motioning for Vila to push a button to close the door. "I wonder if t hey have missed me."
"More likely they have discovered Orac's tampering," Avon pointed out. "They could not know the source, but unless someone was familiar with Orac's abilities, they would have to suspect that the damage was being done by someone here."
"I hope," Blake said, "that whatever is going on down here is keeping them too busy to notice the Liberator."
"Maybe it's the Liberator that set off the alarms," said Vila. "They might have come back early. I think we should get out of here." He raised his bracelet.
Blake put out an arm to stop him. "It's still too early, Vila."
"You never know."
"I do know that if they are monitoring communications, they'll pick it up if we call in too early. Wait."
So Vila did, complaining loudly all the while. Angier's ramblings provided a counterpoint; he went on and on about conditioning techniques, discussing various methods that Kordis might have used, and the vagueness of his tone did nothing to reassure them.
"I thought you knew exactly what Kordis had done," Blake cut in.
"I do. I do. Well enough to alter it, at least."
"You had better," Avon told him, his face cold. "If this is just your way to ensure rescue, you will regret it."
"Oh, no, I wouldn't lie. I'll have you speaking properly again in no time. You can do away with that interesting little device of yours; remember, I want to study it."
Avon would give it to him gladly if he succeeded, but he was not prepared to tolerate failure, and Angier read it in his face. He took a nervous step away from Avon.
At that moment, Cally contacted them. "Blake, stand by to teleport."
Blake raised his bracelet. "Bring us up, Cally." They materialized on the ship just as it was buffeted by an explosion.
"What the--" Blake began, but Cally said urgently, "Pursuit ships. We've got to get out of here."
They set off the for the flight deck at a run. Angier followed eagerly, anxious to see more.
"Jenna, get us out of here," Blake ordered as they reached the flight deck. "I'm trying. Zen, evasive course out of here, speed standard by eight."
+Confirmed.+
"There are only two pursuit ships," she told Blake. "We can outrun them easily once we are clear."
+Plasma bolt launched,+ Zen reported.
"Activate the force wall," ordered Blake. Avon complied just in time. Even so, they were jolted a bit. Then they were past the pursuit ships and running. The next plasma bolt missed. \par \par }\pard \qc \li0\ri0\nowidctlpar\faauto\rin0\lin0\itap0 {***** \par }\pard \qj \li0\ri0\nowidctlpar\faauto\rin0\lin0\itap0 {
It wasn't until the pursuit ships were out of detector range that Dr. Angier was able to begin deprogramming tre atment on Avon. He, Avon, and Orac were sealed away in the medical unit, while the rest of them remained on the flight deck. Avon was still determined to leave the Liberator if Dr. Angier should fail, and nothing that Blake would say would deter him. Even Vila had made an attempt to persuade him, to everyone's surprise, including his own. But Avon remained adamant.
Several hours passed, and the tension on the flight deck was growing worse by the minute when Dr. Angier reappeared. It was evident that all wa s not well; he seemed to have shrunk somehow, and there was a dispirited air about him. He looked from person to person and said sadly, "Well, I can't seem to make it work. I don't know what Kordis was up to, but whatever it was, it's something different from anything I ever taught him."
"You mean Avon still can't talk?" Vila demanded in dismay.
"I'm afraid not." He gave a helpless shrug. "Blake, he would like to see you; he'll be in his cabin. I told him I would relay the message."
Blake nodded. "All right," he said and left the flight deck
#
"Avon?"
The computer expert raised his eyes from a printout that he had been studying. "Come in, Blake," he said flatly. The mechanical voice sounded worse than ever to Blake, but he was growing accustomed to it in a way. He could almost hear the feeling in it, the reluctance to have this interview and at the same time, Avon's anxiousness to have it done. But he might have been reading more into it than he should, so he said as calmly as possible, "Dr. Angi er says it didn't work."
"No. It didn't."
"Is he going to try again?"
"There is no point, Blake. It is finished. We had an agreement. and now I want to proceed with it. I've found a planet where you can leave me."
"So you're just going to run away?" Blake challenged him. "Give up? That's not like you, Avon. I thought you wanted the Liberator someday. If you leave now, you'll never have that chance."
"Perhaps not. But it is my choice, Blake. I choose to go. It would not be wise to try to stop me."
"We certainly won't restrain you if you insist on going, Avon. But at least grant us the right to be concerned about you."
"I grant no such thing. We have been of use to each other, Blake. Now that usefulness is past. The last use you can be to me is to take me to Barsten and leave me there. The Federation leaves it alone for the most part and I can elude them if they should come."
"Why Barsten?" Blake asked.
"Because they are developing new computer systems there, and at least that is something I can do. Teleport me down outside the main city and then we will be free of each other."
"Is there no way to convince you to stay? This isn't the end of the world, you know."
"No? You and Cally cringe every time I speak. How long do you think I could endure that without being driven to my limits. I know you mean well, Blake, and perhaps the others do as well, but why make it worse? It will be easier for all of us if I go now."
"Did you know that Vila says he would like to come with you?"
That was something that Avon had obviously never expected, and for a moment, he appeared to consider it, but then he shook his head. "No, Blake. Vila would come to regret it, and I do not accept that responsibility." He gave a half smile. "We would be at each other's throats in days."
That might well be true, but Blake didn't say so. Instead he asked, "Is there nothing that I can do to convince you?"
"No."
"Cally and I will adjust, you know that. Look at Vila. He had no trouble and neither did Jenna,"
"Perhaps you could adjust, but could Cally? I don't know. Put yourself in my place, Blake. Imagine how long you could endure pity."
That was more than Blake had ever expected to hear from Avon, and he could tell how much it had cost the other man to say it. Cally did pity Avon, t hough Blake was sure she would come to terms with the problem eventually. He suspected that Cally had always felt closer to Avon than she had to the rest of them. She seemed to empathize with him more now than the others did, but Blake had watched her reactions to Avon, and he knew 'that Avon had watched them, too, and decided he could not endure them. He would end his problem, and Cally's, by simply removing it.
"All right," Blake said. "I understand, Avon. But I don't have to like it."
"No one is expecting you to." He looked at Blake steadily. "Well?"
"Well?" echoed Blake.
"You will not try to stop me?"
"No. But the others might."
"1 don't want to see them."
"Avon, you owe them that much. Especially Vila, since he has offered to go with you."
"No. You may make my farewells. 1 do not choose to enact a maudlin scene in the teleport section. I will remain here until we reach Barsten, then I will teleport down alone."
"I can't order them to stay out of the teleport section."
"They are your followers. They will obey your commands."
Blake almost imagined he could hear the emphasis on the word "they," but that was not possible. He shook his head. "I'll do as you ask, Avon. I owe you that much after all this time. But I think you are making a mistake."
"You are entitled to your opinion." He turned away. "Leave me alone, Blake. If you are going to let me go, at least do it cleanly."
Blake knew he owed Avon that, but before he went, he reached over and clasped Avon's shoulder for a moment. Avon stiffened. "We're hours out of Barsten," Blake told him. "And we have to drop Dr. Angier off first. If you should change your mind before then, let me know."
"I won't."
#
"Well?" Vila demanded as soon as Blake returned to the flight deck. "Is he going to stay?"
Blake shook his head. "No, I'm sorry, but I couldn't persuade him. I even reminded him that he wanted to take the Liberator away from me one day, but he didn't seem to care."
"Did you tell him I'd offered to go with him?" Vila asked nervously. He wasn't sure, even now, why he'd made the offer; the only answer that occurred to him couldn't possibly be the right one. He just knew he wasn't sure he wanted to hear Blake's reply.
"Yes, I told him, Vila, and I'm sorry, but he wouldn't agree. I would like to think of him having someone with him, even if it did run us short of crew. Besides, I thought you might eventually have persuaded him to come back to us." He gave Vila a sympathetic look. "For what it's worth, I think he appreciated the offer."
"Oh," said Vila. "Well, then, what are we going to do? We can't just let him go, can we?"
Jenna smiled at him. "Think of it, Vila. No one to lecture you, pick on you, tell you that you are a fool."
"Well; maybe I was used to it, then."
Cally turned to Blake. "It is my fault, isn't it? It is because I have not yet been able to adjust to the change."
"I don't think that is the only reason, Cally," Blake told her. "Avon is a proud and independent man, and something like this would bother him more than it might bother Vila or me, for instance, especially when it changes the way we react to him. But it is not your fault. If we must blame anyone, it is Kordis. I wish we could read those notes." He looked around. "Where is Dr. Angier?"
"He said he was tired, Blake, so I showed him to a spare cabin so that he could rest until we dropped him off," Cally explained. "I think he really regretted not being able to help Avon."
"I don't trust him," Jenna said.
"What d'you mean?" Vila asked. "You don't think he's still Federation?"
"He could be. If Kordis had communicated with Servalan, she would have had time to set things up. Maybe our capturing Angier was what they wanted. He could reinforce or complete the programming."
Cally was shaking her head. "No, Jenna. I don't feel that way, somehow. I do not say we should trust him completely, but he did not feel evil."
"But he might be," Vila said. "We should check, Blake. I don't like this."
"You never like anything, Vila," Blake returned, but he agreed. It couldn't hurt to talk to Angier. "I'll go and see him. You come with me."
"Me?" Vila squeaked. "Why me?"
"Because I told you to. <I>Now</I>, Vila."
"Oh, very well , if I must."
#
They found Dr. Angier sleeping. He roused as Blake bent over him. "Oh dear, is there a problem? Avon is all right, isn't he? He didn't suffer any ill effects, did he? I hope not."
"We hope not too. You were the one who brought up Servalan's name down on Galliad. Now I can't help but wonder if that wasn't be cause you had recently been in contact with her--and if Kordis hadn't been in contact with her first. If you have done anything further to Avon, you are going to regret it for the rest of your life."
"Which may not be very long at my age. No, Blake. Servalan never contacted me. I can see why you might be suspicious, though. Why not use that marvelous computer of your, Orac, to determine if I'm what I claim to be."
"I think we will. Come along, Dr. Angier. If we're wrong, we'll apologize, and I'll be sorry to have disturbed your rest. But if you've done anything further to Avon, then we must know about it"
#
They returned with Angier to the flight deck, and Blake inserted Orac's key. "Orac?"
"I am busy," Orac snapped. "Kindly state your problem quickly. I do not have time to be continually interrupted by your petty concerns."
"We need to know if Dr. Angier did really try to alter the programming that Kordis practiced on Avon--and to know if Angier is really what he claims to be."
"Of course he is. And attempts to alter programming failed because of a lack of information. Does that answer your question?"
It did. Angier was on the level--and Avon still could not speak. "Thank you, Orac," Blake said and removed the key. That left them no options at all.
#
After delivering Angier to a planet not too far out of their way where he claimed to have contacts, they proceeded to Barsten and arrived there four hours later. Blake went with Avon to the teleport section. Now that the time had come to leave, Avon seemed remarkably reluctant to do so. "Put me down outside the city, Blake," he instructed.
"Outside the city, Barsten is a wilderness, Avon," Blake reminded him. "There are dangerous animals and rugged terrain. It wouldn't be very safe."
"Perhaps not. But I am armed, and I did not ask to be put down far from the city. Just outside the gates will do." He fastened the bracelet around his wrist, perhaps for the last time. "All right, Blake," he said. "Put me down."
Blake tried one last time to come up with an excuse to keep Avon on the ship, but nothing else came to mind. He remembered all the disagreements he and Avon had had, times that Avon had been difficult, stubborn, even cruel, and found that none of that mattered. In its own way, this was as hard as losing Gan had been.
"Don't delay, Blake," Avon said. "I will not change my mind." His eyes met Blake's, held them, and for a moment, they exchanged a look. Then he turned away quickly, and Blake reached for the controls.
"Goodbye, Avon," he said. There was nothing left to do. He activated the teleport.
When the shimmer had died, he looked up to find Vila standing in the doorway. "I know he didn't want any of us here," Vila said, "but I was just passing by and I thought I might a s well have one last look. Then I can go back to the flight deck and tell myself how well off I am. I mean, no one is going to pick on me and tell me I'm an idiot, not like Avon does. Did." He added in a small voice, "I'd got sort of used to it."
"I know, Vila," Blake said. "I'm going to miss him, too."
"We're not really just going to leave him, are we?"
"We'll remain on station for a bit--in case he changes his mind." Personally, Blake didn't think for a minute that Avon was going to change his mind, bu t he couldn't bring himself to leave immediately. Waiting might only make it worse, but he was determined to do it. "He can still call in," he said. "He's got his bracelet."
And as if to prove it, Avon did contact them. "Avon to }{\i Liberator}{. Down and safe. Blake, you had better come down here and get my bracelet. I will not be needing it."
"No, Avon, you keep it."
"No. If a Federation official sees it, it could be a danger to me. And once the Liberator has gone, it will be of no further use. Come and get it, Blake."
"Very well." Blake looked over at Vila. "Operate the teleport, will you, Vila?" He put on a bracelet and a gun, and took his place. "Put me down."
#
He materialized in a small clearing, surrounded with thick clumps of bushes and tall, drooping trees. It was getting on toward evening, and the lights of the nearby city were coming on, but under the trees, it was starting to grow dark. Avon was waiting on the far side of the clearing, and as he saw Blake, he strode across and thrust his bracelet into his hand. "You had best get back to the Liberator quickly," he said and turned away.
He had gone two steps when something growled loudly in the shadows under the trees. The two of them spun around to see where the sound was coming from--the animal life on Barsten was said to be large and dangerous--but nothing moved.
"Get back to the ship, Blake," Avon began when a gigantic black shape burst out of the bushes and charged. It moved ponderously and it had a rough, leathery hide. Its massive head swung this way and that as it scented them, but it did not seem to see very well.
Avon fired automatically, and he hit it, but it didn't even slow down. Blake jumped back frantically out of the way. The animal hesitated, undecided about which of them to chase, and it ran between them, one massive shoulder knocking Avon aside. He staggered and fell, unhurt but winded, and scrambled quickly back out of the range of one huge foot.
"Avon!" Blake shouted. "Get back."
Avon tried to reply, but the throat amplifier had been jarred loose in the fall, and no sound emerged. He made a hasty grab for it, but his fingers came up empty. The creature charged again.
Avon was up and running. The animal was big, but it was slow, an d he was able to outdistance it with no effort. Spinning around, he saw Blake leveling his gun at the creature, feet braced. He fired and this time it staggered. Blake shot again. As he did, a second animal came out of the trees behind Blake and charged straight at him.
"Blake! Behind you!"
Blake spun quickly and saw the animal. As the first one finally collapsed, he raced past it and thrust Avon's teleport bracelet back into his hand. "Put that on and no arguments," Blake said. "There'll be a safer place to put you down." And as Avon complied, he raised his bracelet. "Vila, bring us up quickly."
#
Vila must have had his hands on the equipment because it was the fastest pickup Avon could remember. They stood there a moment, relieved to be out of danger, then Blake drew a shaky breath and said, "Thank you. If you hadn't shouted, that thing would have made mincemeat out of me."
Avon started to reply, and caught himself as he remembered the lost speaker. "But I can't..." he began, and though his voice sounded hoarse and rusty, it was undeniably real, non-mechanical. He froze.
"Yes, you can," Blake said, grinning broadly.
"He can talk again," Vila realized.
"And, as usual, you are stating the obvious, Vila," Avon told him. It felt good to sound natural again.
"Well, I wondered," Vila said.
"What do you mean?"
"You did have a bit more expression in your voice when you talked, even with that gadget, and Orac said it wouldn't convey expression, so I thought that maybe you were starting to get your voice back, but I wasn't sure, and I didn't want to say anything in case I was wrong."
"But Dr. Angier's attempts to reverse the conditioning didn't work," Blake said. "Vila, if you thought something had worked, you should have said so."
"No, this was before Angier tried anything. Then, when Angier said it hadn't worked, I thought I must have imagined it. Besides, nobody ever listens to me anyway. But maybe Angier couldn't make it work because Avon didn't believe he could. I don't suppose that makes any sense. "
"Oddly enough, it does," Avon decided. "Remarkable as it seems, Vila might actually be right. I did not believe that Angier could succeed."
"You mean it might have been that simple all along?" Blake sounded very skeptical.
"If it was simple, we could have done something about it sooner," Avon said. "Maybe it had a limited time span and simply wore off. We may never know."
"At least it wore off in time," Blake said. He watched as Avon removed his teleport bracelet. "Do I take it that this means you've decided to stay with us after all?"
"Of course. I've told you that one day this will be my ship." He gave Blake a disconcerting smile and headed for the flight deck.
#
Cally was alone there when he arrived, and she looked up in surprise. For a moment, she was delighted to see him and relieved that he had not gone after all. Then, remembering his voice, she tensed slightly.
Avon gave her a sideways look and strode over to Zen. "Zen, flight status?"
+Stationary orbit around the planet Barsten.+
Cally's eyes widened. "Avon!"
Vila interrupted before he could reply. "It's looks like we're back to normal. He's going to start bossing me about again, and making all our lives miserable, just like always."
"I think we can take it," Blake said with a smile. "Don't you, Cally?"
She looked at Avon and saw that the tension of the past few days had gone from his face. He seemed a bit wary about everyone's reaction to his recovery, but that was normal. And he was evidently back to stay. "I think so," she rep lied. "How do you feel, Avon? No more pain?"
"No. And I will not be plagued with questions about my health."
"See, told you," Vila said gleefully. "Obnoxious as always."
Avon glared at him. "Vila, you are rapidly becoming intolerable. Without me to restrain you, you were starting to get out of hand." But there was a hint of humor in his eyes and a bit more warmth than he usually permitted to show.
Vila looked embarrassed, but covered it up at once. "Avon," he replied with relish, "shut up."
And this time, everybody laughed.
The end
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