Mal, Wash, and Jayne were being held together in a tiny underground concrete cell in the base of the coleseum. Overhead, they could hear the pounding of feet as a massive audience was taking their seats, and the dull wave of noise coming from every direction spoke to the enourmous size of the building they were confined beneath.

A burly guard outside the metal door had just finished informing them of the nature of their impending deaths, and Mal stood trying to think of any sort of acceptable solution. Near as he could tell, there wasn't one. They could enter the arena armed with axes, knives, and other rudimentary weapons and fight their fellow prisoners to the death, and anyone left standing would be finished off by tigers and leopards let loose in the arena.

"But you don't got ta' fight if you don't want to," the guard had explained cruelly. Those without the desire or the stomach to do battle would simply be tortured and killed.

Mal looked at his two shipmates sharing the cell and their fate with him. Jayne, pacing about not unlike a tiger himself, inspecting every inch of the cell for some sort of weakness. Wash, standing quietly to the side, stunned. Wash caught Mal gazing at him out of the corner off his eye and looked over, his eyes asking Mal all the questions he couldn't bring himself to voice.

"I wouldn't mind getting me a tiger," grunted Jayne.

"How we going to do this?" asked Wash. "Walk out there and...what? Try to defend ourselves 'til we go down?"

"You came for me. I'll come for you."

Mal shook his head, River's words weighing on his mind. "Jayne, Wash, I got no right to order you to do this, so take it as a suggestion. The others, they're gonna come for us, try to get us out of here. I got a mind to be here for them when they show." Wash nodded acceptance.

"You think we're gonna be rescued?" asked Jayne in surprise. "I don't mind getting beat on for a while if it means we're gonna get out of here."

Mal shook his head sadly. "No," he said, his voice