Author's Note:

As Beverly Sills allegedly once said to Linda Ronstadt, on the subject of her being thrilled at the opportunity to sing the role of Mimi in La Bohème: "You and every other mezzo, honey…"

For anyone who's ever been a hot Blake's 7 fan, writing a 5th season for this operatically ended series has odds-on at some point made their list of things they'd like to do before they die, and waay back in 1997, I dug into my attempt at it. Never finished, like most such efforts—but I did get an outline laid down for most of a 12-episode series, with three eps written and a fourth drafted.

All the usual disclaimers apply: I own nothing of the original properties here. This was written to relieve my fannish frustrations at the time, and I release it into the wild with no hope beyond that it may amuse passers-by.


Chapter 1 Gauda Prime

Around her all was darkness, cut with a smoky, pulsing red light, and close around her, the smells of battle.

Dazed, Arlen pulled her free hand towards her. Pushed out, confused, in an effort to raise herself. Slipped and fell hard on her elbow, as her fingers slid in wetness on the floor. The warm stickiness and smell of blood. Too much blood, and somewhere near her, fire, a thin, acrid smoke filling the air. But how? she thought muzzily.

She opened her eyes as a shower of sparks burst from the nearest conduit column, in a crackle of shorting circuitry. Wincing, she bowed her head, drew a rasping breath, and determined not to retch. Stronger, now, the unmistakeable sounds and odours of death. But not hers. Beyond the dull pounding in her head and aching neck, scraped elbow, and the stiffening bruise across her cheek, she was unhurt. Nothing that mattered, next to the shambles made of her mission.

Stubbornly gathering herself again, she pushed up, twisted under the dead weight pinning her legs. The corpse of a Federation trooper, the mask beneath his helmet torn half away. Another lay beside her. Blood still pumped slowly from the wound in his chest, his breathing thick with bubbles from a torn lung. It choked and halted as she stared, stunned, into the reddened darkness. In front of her a third soldier knelt beside Blake s body, head bowed, moaning, one hand clutching the shattered arm from which his energy rifle still hung tangled in its sling.

Beyond him lay a circle of slumped, black-uniformed bodies. Half a dozen? Eight? More, scattered by the steps where the rest of the rebels had fallen. Some still moving, trying to move, crying weakly. More not. In a corner, one man trying to scream, and another gagging, sickened, beside him. In the distance shouting, angry, unintelligible.

Chaos. In how many minutes? She couldn't have been unconscious that long. Time for the first squad to break through to the tracking gallery, cut down the others, surround—him. Her gaze fell to the man in black and silver fallen, twisted, on the floor beside Blake. Avon. The last thing she could have expected. Now too clearly the last thing any of them had expected.

Her mission had been to confirm that Blake was here on Gauda Prime, and to take him alive if she could. The galaxy's most wanted criminal. The terrorist revolutionary who had almost brought down the Federation, with the destruction of its central control complex on Star One. The man who had lowered its defenses to the Andromedan invasion fleet. For two years Security had pursued every hint, every rumour as to his whereabouts. Almost got him, him and his ragtag band of rebels, on Morpheniel a year before. When rumour had placed him here as a bounty hunter, she had come. Three months' careful setup, establishing herself as a killer and would-be revolutionary. Worthy of his hunting in either persona.

Wasted effort, for the scarred, pathetic failure she had found, but found him she had, and been ready to count coup on his grubby hide. Six hours, to call in the pacification force. Less than half an hour remaining, and he had arrived, and in seconds, it had been over. Blake dead on the floor, and now—could she even hope for his killer's life in exchange? If he still breathed, she couldn't see it from where she lay, and there were limits to the charge even a strong man could absorb, and live. Limits too likely exceeded, for this one. Damn you! she thought. No justice, in that peaceful expression.

She snapped around as another body stirred, beyond the one still pinning her feet. One of the others...the bastard who had hit her. Of course... Weapons set for stun. As ordered. There might be a chance to salvage this mess.

She twisted urgently, kicking herself free of the body as she looked for her sidearm. He had to have taken it, but the way he had fallen—there! It was on the floor. Beyond the trooper beside her, almost against the far wall. She scrambled to retrieve it, lost her balance and fell dizzily, reaching, rolling. If that one were recovering, the others could not be far behind, and the weapon Blake had given her could be set to kill.

Behind her, Vila started as the corpse struck him, stared up into the trooper's ruined face, and rolled away with a yell. Pushed himself up and stared in horror, shut his eyes and wrenched away, instinctively hugging himself. No way the man could be alive, that deep a wound torn in his throat. Plasma charge... He wiped his palm against his sleeve, shaking, and thought: Avon. Squinting in the murky air, he took in crumpled, black-uniformed bodies. A lot of them, no telling how many in the shadows. A few still moving. One man kneeling, swaying, dazedly gripping his shoulder, near the two bodies at the centre of the ragged circle. One in scruffy browns and a once white shirt, flat on his back and all too clearly dead. No surviving three plasma bolts taken straight to the gut.

Oh, Blake, he mourned silently, two years believing you were dead, and now you are... And fallen beside him, pale and still as death, Avon. Eyes closed, his face peaceful, the rifle still cradled loosely against his arm. Oh, Avon, what a moment for you to have gone completely mad.

Near their feet, Soolin lay unmoving, her long hair fallen in a veil across her face, blaster still clenched in her fist. If she was alive, there was no telling it in this pulsing light. No telling Dayna's fate, either. Where she lay in the furthest corner of the room, his view of her blocked by a trooper s corpse, she could be alive or dead. But Tarrant, lying half-raised against the steps leading down into the gallery—alive, and recovering.

As Vila watched, he opened unfocused eyes, caught breath, and struggled to sit up. Pressed a hand to his injured leg; gasped, visibly fighting down the pain, then pushed on, grimacing.

"Ah—!" he said at length, lifting his head. He looked across to where Vila knelt, watching him. "Vila..." He stopped. "...don't move."

"Don't move?"

"That's right!" a voice rapped harshly, behind him, and instinctively, he turned. The woman he had hit, rising from a crouch in the shadows. Cold eyes, even in this ruddy light, and the colder, darker muzzle of her gun. "If either of you move, you're dead," she said in a voice colder yet. "This sidearm isn't set for stun." She stepped forward over the body at her feet and lashed out quickly, kicking the gun from Soolin s hand as she stirred. "If any of you move!"

"You'll kill us all..." Tarrant said wearily. He brushed at the smoky air, coughing; wiped roughly at the cut over his left eye, as it began to bleed again.

"If I have to!" Pure hate in that voice. She sidestepped around the huddled trooper, not taking her eyes off them, and gingerly, Vila sank back on his heels. "After what he's done, I need you alive—but I don't need all of you." Carefully, gun still levelled, she went down on one knee by Avon's head and felt for the pulse at his throat. "If he's alive, I may not need any of you."

"Makes it hard to know what to wish for..." Tarrant sighed, followed her movement. "I'm sorry... Is he alive?"

"You think it's going to matter?" Vila flinched as a renewed volley of shots echoed outside the room, followed by a rush of footsteps and muffled shouting. Something clattered, thrown hard, in the passage between the columns, and in terror he threw himself flat, arms over his head. Beside him, Tarrant followed suit with a cry, as the room shuddered with the force of an explosion and the air filled with flying debris.

With a second, less violent report, a cloud of dense smoke boiled out of the upper gallery, smoke through which poured the uneven clatter of booted feet, and the snap of energy rifles charged for firing.

Above them, a masked trooper burst through the white vapour, energy rifle at the ready. More flooded into the gallery from its sides, spread out, circling fast.

Still kneeling, Arlen threw out a forbidding hand. "Stop!" She glared at the man as he froze in surprise. "I'm Arlen!—Major, Division One!" As his rifle snapped up, she lowered her sidearm and pointed. "Keep those three where they where they are, and watch out—there's another one, female, somewhere on the floor behind me!" She rose as a Federation troop captain, masked and ominous in his black leathers, strode between the columns at the top of the steps. "Troop leader! Are you in command of this force?"

"I am," he said flatly. You, I take it, are our contact."

"I am." She lifted her head. "Major Arlen, attached to the pacification program under Commissioner Sleer."

"And at the moment, the least of my concerns." He surveyed the room, came slowly down the steps, turned abruptly to the nearest trooper. "Well, what are you waiting for?! This area is secure! Get the medical team in here!" To another, "You! get that fire out, step up the ventilation, and get the lights back on!" Frustrated, he fanned the air in front of him with a gloved hand, then unmasked and pushed up his visor. Stepping carefully, circled among the bodies, face tight with anger. "Damn the woman," he said grimly, under his breath. "I knew this would happen!"

"Sir!" The man at his feet, checking for signs of life, looked up. Didn't quite glance at Arlen, warning, as the officer scowled down at him. "At least you got the medics to back us up."

"Much good it does the men these scum have killed!" He turned on her, across Blake's body. "Was it worth it? Can you tell me this has been worth our lives?"

"Is any rebel's life worth one of ours?" she snapped back. She could have him, for that question so close to treason, but in this room, at this moment, it could be her destruction, and so nearly in the heat of battle, it would otherwise be that of a loyal man.

"Your target is dead!"

"His killer will serve as well," she said coldly, "and he may live, if your medics get here quickly. When they do, he has priority."

"Then he may die, if I choose to leave him," he said, livid, eyes fixed on hers. "My priority is my men."

"Your men are dead! Except for those who will survive on their own—and your priority is loyalty." More than an edge of warning, there. "This one and his friends are as wanted as Blake was, and the Commissioner will want them all." Looking down, deliberate. "For her, this one may even be worth it." She threw back her head, staring at him, as the lights came on, and more men picked their way into the gallery, medic greys among the black. "So what's your answer?"

"Have your way!" he said grimly. "See that he lives! See that they all live—but then, if Commissioner Sleer doesn't want them, rest assured that I will."