The Federal Officer pushed his cap up with the back of his hand and sighed.

'What's this,' he demanded kicking at a crate with his boot. Mal winced.

'Whiskey,' he replied, 'a gift'.

Luckily they'd unloaded their cargo this morning and this was a gift from a satisfied customer, not enough to cause problems but it might make the officer look further, maybe discover the well-stocked infirmary and wonder who the medic was on board. Mal realized too late, he should have asked Inara to stay around to lend that much needed air of respectability. The officer had his quota to fill and searching these old Firefly ships often brought up a bit of contraband that looked good on the statistics. He

glanced around the cargo bay at the crew, two women, four men, nothing very interesting.

'You have papers?' he demanded, grabbing the papers from Zoe and inspecting them closely.

Zoe stared impassively back at him, her eyebrow lifted scornfully.

'Your official seal is still out of date Captain Harbatkin,' the officer frowned suspiciously at Mal, 'checked but not authorized on the cruiser Magellan. I think we need to search this ship from aft to stern.'

He spoke into his com and two more officers appeared outside. They began searching through the crates of supplies.

'You have any passengers? I'll need their ID,' he said, taking Book's ID as the preacher stepped forward at the same time. He scanned it through as he peered into the nearest crate hoping to find some unauthorized cargo. Book's details came through and he read them thoughtfully.

'OK, forget it. There's nothing here, you can go.' Mal showed faint surprise then, not giving him the chance to change his mind, quickly signalled to Wash to head for the bridge and take off.

-------------------

Mal and Zoe sat at one end of the table. Jayne sat at the other, digging little chips of wood out of the end with his knife. For once no-one stopped him.

'I knew something' weren't right,' he snarled pushing the knife in further.

'Jayne's righ