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Aeryn put her hands behind her back allowing John to place the binders on them.  "I can't believe that I'm going along with another one of your plans."

"Yeah, well, I don't usually get into bondage on a first date either, Sunshine, but I'm guessing that there's a pretty strict dress code in this place.   If this works out, all the other PeaceKeepers will just see a prisoner being escorted, besides  I'm not even fastening them."

"If this works!  More likely this is going to get us killed," she grumbled.

"It's not like we have a lot of time here, Aeryn.  When we don't show up in that interrogation room, Lieutenant Nurf Herder is going to send someone to see what the problem is.  It would be best if we weren't still here arguing about this."  He finished fixing the binders and stepped back.

"I'm doing it aren't I," she snapped.  "Come on," she growled as she nudged the door open with her foot and entered the corridor.

John walked behind her with his hands authoritatively placed on the pulse rifle.  "I figure that we have five, maybe ten minutes before someone comes looking.  Do you think we can get to an exit before that?"

Aeryn felt naked without her weapons and totally exposed.  She could see other Peacekeepers walking toward them and crossing corridors in front of them.  "I don't know.  We need to get to transport," she became quiet as a group of three soldiers passed them.  They glanced briefly at her but then put their eyes back front and center and walked on by.  "Luckily, all Peacekeeper bases are laid out in the same configuration."

Suddenly, the hallway sounded with a low level hum.  "What is that? Are we busted?" Crichton asked with a certain amount of dread.

"General alert to signify an escape," Aeryn said as she began to run down a vacant hallway, shrugging out of the binders.  She glanced quickly behind her to see if  the soldiers whom she had just passed were in pursuit as well as to make sure that Crichton was following her.  The corridor ended in a wall.

"A dead end," Crichton panted as he came up beside her.  He turned and watched the hallway that they had just run down, rifle at the ready.  "Come on, we have to go back."

"No, it's here somewhere.  It has to be!"  Aeryn frantically ran her hands along the walls.  "There, up there!  Help me!"  She pointed to a corner of the ceiling.  "An interior maintenance access hatch."

Crichton looked up at the area that she indicated and noticed a round hatch recessed into the ceiling.  He took a few steps over, readjusted the rifle and then knelt down and pretended to be a ladder.  He grunted slightly as Aeryn climbed shakily onto his shoulder in order to reach the covering.  He heard, rather than saw, her slap the center of the hatch.  Then her weight seemed to increase as she used his back for a platform in order to jump and then lever herself up and through the opening.  He stood and looking up saw her head framed by the now open hatch.

"Throw me the rifle," she whispered tensely.  Crichton tossed the gun up and she deftly caught it.  "Now come on."  She reached down her hand to help him.

John stepped back as far as the space would allow and then ran.  He jumped at the wall and used his momentum to give him lift.  Catching Aeryn's hand, he used it to guide him to the entrance.  First one hand and then the other caught the lip of the opening.  He pulled himself up with Aeryn continuing to tug at him while whispering urgently for him to hurry.  With a final great effort he threaded his upper body through the hatch and then pulled up his legs.  Once in, Aeryn secured the hatch.

They squatted quietly beside the portal as below them they heard the sound of several boot clad pairs of feet running.  Quickly the sound receded.

John looked at Aeryn and tilted his head in a cocky fashion while giving her a devil-may-care smile.  She met his eyes, her relief at their narrow and perhaps temporary escape evident.  Slowly John's expression changed to one of seriousness.  He leaned in close to her and pitched his voice low, suggesting intimacy.  "Aeryn, that was a little close."  He briefly looked down as if gathering his thoughts.  "I know this isn't the time or the place but I've been thinking and it's possible that we won't make it.  This could be my last chance to ask you a question that I have been wanting to ask for some time."

Aeryn suddenly found her mouth dry with a different type of fear.  "Yes?"

He leaned in closer, his lips practically brushing her ear.  "What's a nurf?"


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