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Friar Barnadine: Thou hast committed-

Barabas: Fornication – but that was in another country,

And besides, the wench is dead.

Christopher Marlowe, The Jew of Malta

Prologue the first

The man sitting at the bar was watching them, she just knew it, and she was pretty sure that he could hear what they were saying as well. She was doing as he had suggested, it wasn't too hard to appear afraid and reluctant; but why couldn't the doctor keep his voice down? She definitely didn't want him here, near her, but she didn't…she had to admit that she didn't want him to go back there, either. Probably a touch of Stockholm syndrome in her system, but she couldn't help it; it was built upon the old but still strong foundations of that accursed admiration that simply wouldn't go away, no matter what he said or did.

"The one at the bar's been talking to the bar tender. I think he knows who you are."

"Oh, most likely. I have quite a distinctive face, after all." He knocked back the last of his beer, grinned his damned grin. "Most likely he's alerted the authorities, who will now be swarming towards this charming little bar, with the fervid intention of dragging me back to my cozy home of the last few decades."

"So…what are you going to do now?" Why did he have to be smiling? Why couldn't he be nervous or fretful or even look the slightest bit worried; why wasn't he trying to figure out some way to get out of here and foil the 'man' yet again? Why was he just sitting here and letting them come to get him?

He wasn't going to answer her. They might be here any minute now, any second. She had to know, she had to ask because she knew she'd certainly never get the chance again after this. Four days, why hadn't she asked before now…

"Doctor, why did you have to escape? They might have let you out, there might have been time left to do what you needed. They never will now. You'll be in there forever, you know that?"

He was still smiling but there was no joy in it, anywhere in his face, in his whole body. "Don't be idealistic, my dear, it becomes ridiculous when I'm involved. Of course they'd never let me out. I know that, they know that I know that, and you should know that by now as well. From the looks of you, I might even have left it too late."

Oh, thank you so very much. "Then why me?"

He grabbed her wrist and oh it hurt, pulled her towards him so fast his teeth nipped her ear, probably by accident, as he spoke; so softly, so unlike his brutish action of a heart beat before. "Because you are, for want of a more categorical word, a 'good' person. Because you are the best person to be in charge of this project, and you'd do a far better job of it than I would. Because I want this to be more successful than I turned out to be. Remember, try to look scared."

"It's not like I need to try." Her heart felt like it was going to burst her throat and spill out of her neck, and if by some miracle it didn't do that then the tears would rip through the back of her gullet instead.

"For what it's worth, I'm sorry for being such a troublesome house guest." He did actually sound sorry, and he sounded as if he meant it as well. "And for making such dubious use of your equipment."

"At least you didn't keep me in the dark about what you were doing; I don't think that I could have stood that." She made a show of struggling with his free arm as if she were trying to free herself. Did she want to? Every moment that they still had together was one moment closer to that dreadful instant when he would be dragged away from her.

"And I respect you far too much to do so."

"You call this respect?"

"Oh yes." He looked over at the bar and back to her between a blink. "They're coming, and our friend at the bar looks like he's about to get up and intervene in our little argument. Such a gentleman, he seems. You remember what we agreed?"

"What if it's too late?"

"Ridiculous. You're perfectly capable of seeing this through, my dear. I trust you; just, please, don't fail me."

"I swear," and then he let her hand go in a way that made it look as if she had wrenched free and she hit him, hit him hard across the face. She tipped the chair backwards so that she could land on the floor and scramble backwards, undignified but realistic in a mad dash for freedom. Dart away from me, he had told her, and she did, scream for help, and she did: "Stay away from me; god, please, help me!" Gasp for breath and try for some tears if you can, and she did, and she found that she hardly had to try because they were coming out like the water pressure turned up high in a shower. "Somebody help me, don't let him near me, keep him away from me!" A hand on her shoulder pulling back even further and a male body coming between her and him even as he stood up; and then there was banging and shouting and crashes and she could still hear herself as she acted and was sincere in her grief; acting the part of a victim, sincere in her sorrow that he had had to do this, that this was the only way he had been able to carry out probably his best hope.

It was the man who had been at the bar and who had spoken to the bar man who had come between her and him, which was quite nice of him, she thought, in that part of her that wasn't screaming and crying on the outside and screaming and crying on the inside. Quite chivalrous. The friendly arm was under her and bearing her up even as they were putting cuffs on him. Play the victim, he had told her, scream about being a prisoner in your own home for four days, give hints at what I might or might not have done to you. She does this and then she buries her face in her rescuer's shoulder, though not too hard. She howls. Oh, she howls.

They pull him away from her. The last sight she gets of him, looking away and out from the fine cloth of a rather expensive tunic, is a smile that might be sardonic and might be happy and might be relieved and might be anything. She wouldn't see him again so that she could ask; she took a guess and settled at grateful. She likes to think it was that, or partly that.

The distinguished gentleman who had saved even when she had not needed to be saved – or might not have needed, at least – soon lets go of her when Star Fleet sweep around her; he goes off to tell an officer about what has happened here, how he recognized him and knew what to do. She hears him say that he longs to get off this planet and away from this people, when such a man as this, of such intelligence and potential, can do such things. She hates his words and agrees with them too. She needs to go away as well, far away. She's so, so sick of humans, of bi-peds, or every single life form. She needs to be alone among her computers. She needs peace.

She is swamped by those needing to scan her and question her and poke her and prod her and find out what he's been doing in those days since he slipped away from them and into her house and her life again. Well, let them question and scan and poke and prod; she remembers what he told her: the more you look like a victim, the less likely they are to search you. And once they're done with her and free her from their concern and guilt at having let him out and get to her, she has such a lot of work to do.

They both have a long way to go.

And let the speculations begin...now! And yes, this will have something to do with the universe of the film. It'll have a lot to do with it, in fact.