Mistral said in response to me suggesting Vila could have pulled a similar move on Avon in the shuttle as he did on Arlen at Gauda Prime: "he was relying on trickery with Arlen. Avon would never have fallen for something like that under those particular circumstances."

Not necessarily. Avon wouldn't have been expecting it from Vila, so Vila would have the element of surprise. Though I still like Anna's suggestion that Vila learnt that trick from Dayna after Orbit so he could defend himself against Avon.

Alison said: "Michael Keating said Vila was crying because he was trying to get his act together to put *himself* out the airlock."

That doens't work for me. Vila looked scared, not like someone bracing himself.

Claudia said: "I don't think Vila would sacrifice himself for Avon, but I think (and this came up during our post-episode discussion) that he *would* sacrifice himself for Blake. Blake would be willing to sacrifice himself for Vila, and Vila would return the favor, in my opinion. But he wouldn't for Avon, because Avon wouldn't for him."

I can imagine this working. Blake, I think, would be the self sacrificing type and if he did so, I can see Vila turning the tables and saying that Blake was more important and should be the survivor. Whether Blake would let him is another question; we saw how badly Gan's death affected him so I don't think he would let Vila die if he could stop it. He would rather die than let Vila die. I think you're spot on about Avon.

Alison said: "After all that is exactly what he did in 'Blake' - sacrifice himself in a very untypical brave act. I think he was able to do it, because he thought he really had no escape, so he had nothing left to lose (I'm talking about in 'Blake')."

This works too, I believe. If Vila realised that the game was up, then he has nothing to lose, which is why he went for Arlen. A more typical Vila move would be to put his hands up and surrender - the guy was a survivor after all.

-- cheers Steve Rogerson http://homepages.poptel.org.uk/steve.rogerson

Redemption 03, 21-23 February 2003, Ashford, Kent Celebrating 25 years of Blake's 7 and 10 years of Babylon 5 http://www.smof.com/redemption