I was burning with questions about the princess but I knew misdirection when I heard it. I realized the Doctor didn’t want Spidrick wondering how and where we'd met her. That would lead to awkward questions about the Graff, wouldn’t it? I kept my peace and let him talk.
'All right. I suppose you did try to help me,' he said, 'Maybe if I give you a sit-rep we can help each other. First, the Graff didn’t attack Rallax. He answered a distress call. A delegation of people and robots met us. Some of the people were aliens, ones we’d never seen. They told us something had happened to their ship. Ship! We thought it was a planet.'
'So did we,' I said.
'It’s big. I knew the Graff was already sizing it up as a potential asset to the war effort, but he acted his part as the valiant rescuer. He listened while they told us that soon after her inaugural launch the warp engines had come on line. They were in permanent orbit around some star, you know, and the engines were for emergencies only. But the engines fired, they warped and suddenly they were here and everything was wrong. They couldn’t raise their headquarters and the few signals they could receive were strange. And then a passing farm freighter told them the date. You aren’t going to believe this, but...'
'But Rallax is a product of the Fourth Great and Bountiful Human Empire. One hundred and eighty-seven thousand, six hundred and seventy years in the future. Give or take a few centuries,' said the Doctor.
We stared.
He shrugged. 'What? I read it somewhere.'
Spidrick continued. 'I don’t know anything about a bountiful empire, but yeah, you’re right. 200,000 years, they told us. Somehow that warp made them move in time. Crazy, huh? Time travel is one of the greatest weapons ever and a bunch of tourists discover it by accident. Thing is, it messed up the ship. There was supposed to be an orbital bridge; that’s where all the technicians and officers were stationed. It didn’t survive the trip. They showed us the wreckage, strewn over half the northern hemisphere.'
'Surely there were some technicians here,' I said.
'Just a handful. Fewer by the time we arrived. They tried to jury-rig the garbage disposal system as a substitute for the busted transmat but no-one returned.'
I thought about gods falling from the sky and shuddered.
'But what about the robots? Couldn’t they do the repairs?'
'We asked the same thing. They were insulted at the idea. Some future custom or other. No robot technicians and no robot security. Just tour staff, historical reenactors, bartenders... that sort of thing. Menials.'
'Spidrick,' the Doctor asked, 'we were attacked by armed Rallaxan robots in armour...'
'Yeah, I seen ‘em before, upstairs. They must have been reprogrammed after the Graff left.'
'Why did the Graff leave?' I asked. It seemed to me he’d have valued a mobile planet. Why was he bothering with Ribos?
Spidrick’s face darkened. He was reluctant to talk about it.
'See, the thing is... Listen, I’m a proud citizen. I willingly serve the Levithian throne. And like it or not, that’s the Graff Vynda-K. May the gods forgive my treason, but I was coming to doubt my Lord’s fitness... I hate to say it, but -'
Suddenly there were four loud knocks. I swear, the Doctor almost hit the ceiling. I didn’t remember him being this twitchy on Ribos.
'You may hate to say it, but I have no such reservations!' declared a voice through the door panel, 'the Graff was a tyrant and a fool.'
'Yaka!' snarled Spidrick, rushing to the door. 'Open this and face me, you coward!'
'Back, dog!'
'Better a dog than a traitor!'
'Better a traitor to a madman than a dog to an lost cause!'
'Better a dog to a lost cause than a mad cyborg monk’s lick spittle!'
They both snarled at the Doctor, 'What are you laughing at?'
He beamed at them affectionately, with crinkly eyes and a huge smirky smile, then burst into laughter again.
'Oh,; he said, ;I’m sorry, gentlemen...'
Then I began chuckling, too. 'Lick spittle!'
After a moment Spidrick joined in and I decided he was all right. Yaka just glared and bristled his moustache. 'Stop this at once! You are prisoners of the Tsar Nick and you will demonstrate proper respect!' He, on the other hand, was all wrong.
'Gone a bit native, hasn’t he?' I whispered to the Doctor, who nodded.
Spidrick spoke calmly to Yaka, as one would to an old friend one has realized is a few sandwiches short of a picnic. 'Oh, Yaka. Stop playing this game. The park is closed, brother, and you must stop persecuting those who wish to leave.'
'Foolishness. They have everything they need. Under the Tsar, all men are fed and cared for. There is no want in this land, no conflict save that which you and your underground rabble have instigated.'
He leaned close to the window. 'Spidrick, we could have ruled here! I will rule here! I will raise an army and march on the other lands! Then, when they are subdued, we will move out into the galaxy!'
The Doctor rolled his eyes. I tried not to chuckle.
'The robots won’t let you,' said Spidrick, 'Rasputin and the Tsar will put you in the garbage chute before they allow you to raise an army. You know that!'
'Excuse me,' said the Doctor, 'Your exquisitely detailed plans to conquer the universe are compelling and all but, well, there’s this snag.'
'A snag? What snag is this?'
'It’s just that everyone on Rallax is going to be dead within a year. Maybe two.'
'It’s true,' I added, 'Have you seen the holes in the decks? It’s this gravity circuitry they use. It’s made of dwarf alloy and it’s slipping out of containment.'
'I’m just a soldier,' said Spidrick, 'What does that mean?'
‘It means the gravity here is going to keep getting stronger until the whole thing implodes.’
‘What lies are these?’ scoffed Yaka, ‘I will hear no more of this. “Gravity circuits”! Lennonist nonsense! Enjoy your last evening, gentlemen and dog. At dawn you die!’
The panel snapped shut. His brisk boot steps receded. A distant outer door clanged.
Spidrick said, ‘This is true? We are all doomed?’
‘Never mind that!’ I said, ‘”At dawn you die”, remember?’
‘And never mind that!’ said the Doctor, ‘Spidrick, how did the two of you come here? Obviously the Graff left you, I understand that much, but why? How?’
‘We may as well sit. We have until dawn.’
‘Oh, I’ve no intention of being here at dawn.’
‘You have an escape plan, then?’
‘Well, not as such, no. More of an expectation. But I promise you we’ll get out of here. I just don’t know how, yet. Unstoffe? Any ideas?’
It was nice to be asked. ‘Not yet, Doctor. But even if we get out of this cell, there are bears. And after the bears there’s a wall and a city filled with who-knows-what. Say, Spidrick, how many of these people are robots?’
‘Oh, let’s see. The royals and the monk are robots. Lennon and his advisers; Starr, Sverdlovand the others, are robots. The Cossacks are robots (this impressed me greatly, by the way, remembering their authentic body odour) and so are the bears. Everyone else is human or alien, though the aliens have all been sent north. The loyalists, that’s Yaka’s crowd out there, are mostly descended from the tourists; the freedom fighters are descendants of crew. They remember where they are, who they are, keep the knowledge alive. They’re looking for a way out. Thought I’d found it too, back where we were captured –sorry about the gun, by the way –but Yaka’s spies sniffed me out.’
‘You’re getting ahead of yourself,’ said the Doctor.
‘Oh, yeah. Right. Where was I?’
‘You said the Graff made a mistake.’
‘Yes... remember I said the bridge was destroyed? Well, the Graff found out that the ship’s registry had been salvaged and was in a repair bay. He volunteered to look at it, see if one of our tech boys could do something. Well, we discovered that the thing was still functioning. With a bit of fine-tuning and some servers, the planet could be controlled remotely. We’d had a shore leave on Aye Aye a few months before. Ever hear of it? Rogue colony of scientists for hire? We’d made some trades, forged some contacts. Old Sholakh told us the Graff planned to hack–'
Back in the interrogation room, the Doctor interrupted my telling of Spidrick’s story. 'Oh, we don’t need to get into all the details, do we?'
'Oh, right. Anyway, Bobs, Spidrick told us that the Graff stole the registry...'
'That is correct! We must have have the registry if we are resume control of this vessel!'
'Yes, we’ve established that. Unfortunately, in their state of disgrace, Yaka and Spidrick were ordered to cover the retreat and were stunned by your predecessors. No sooner had the Graff blasted off then Rallax warped again.'
'Yes. It is hundreds of annual time measurements since the attack. The two soldiers were put in stasis and forgotten.'
'Spidrick told us they woke up a few years ago. I guess the system failed. They explored a bit, got lost in corridors and then found themselves in Red Revolution. Hundreds of years later, as you say, but only weeks for them.'
I stood at the window as Spidrick described how the two had attempted to blend into the society they found here. Yaka, attracted to power, ingratiated himself to Rasputin the mad cyborg monk and rapidly rose through the ranks. Spidrick, after failing to rediscover the remote cave they’d entered through, had gone the route of vodka and dissolution, sinking until he met the revolution. That is, the few descendants of the crew who knew they were still on a starship and refused to participate in the mandatory annual revolution.
'They didn’t want to live lives of indolence,' he said, 'They craved real life, real risk. They wanted the stars. I agreed to help and before I knew it John Lennon himself declared me their leader.'
'Good grief! Where did these people learn their history?'
'Why? What’s the matter, Doctor?'
'I wouldn’t know where to start,' muttered the Doctor. 'All right. You got in good with the Bolsheviks. Then what happened?'
'Suddenly Yaka and I became opponents.'
'You were friends before?' asked the Doctor softly.
'We were blood brothers. Now we are enemies, but not by my choice. I would save him if I could. His ambition will kill him.'
The Doctor did not reply. Our questions exhausted, our common ground ploughed, we retreated to our own thoughts. The night settled in.
I lay on the bunk and watched the artificial stars reel across the artificial heavens. Far away, wolves howled at the same sky. I envied their perspective.
The Doctor shook me awake. I blinked at the morning sun, wondering where I was and mildly pleased I didn’t know. Then I heard a familiar voice cry, 'Prepare for inspection!' and I remembered.
I stumbled to the window. Spidrick stood aside and I peered out.
The Tsar’s carpenters did a good job. A three-man gallows stood in the courtyard. Already a small crowd was gathering; some escorted at gunpoint. Above them Yaka stood on the high platform, inspecting the trap door mechanisms and tugging the nooses. My heart leaped when I spotted the princess, flanked by hulking Cossacks, at the gallows steps. She seemed very small there, resplendent as she was in a white furred coat and hat. She seemed to sense my presence or maybe it was just a coincidence or maybe she just assumed we’d be watching; she turned, looked at our window and raised her hands. They were bound.
'Doctor, do you see that?' I asked.
'I saw it earlier. The Tsar’s carpenters did a good job.'
'Doctor, no. It’s Shawneequa. She’s a prisoner, too.'
'Oh, really? That’s interesting, innit?'
'We have to save her!'
He considered this. 'Well... Normally I’d agree, certainly...'
From outside we heard, 'Fetch the prisoners!'
'... but I’m terribly sorry to say, she’s on her own.'
I watched a delegation of troops march toward our prison.
Spidrick grunted. 'I’m wouldn’t worry, my new friend. I suspect she is playing some game even now. Her aptitude for manipulation will serve her well, I think.'
That was rather unfair, I thought. The princess was a genuine, warm person, not someone playing a game.
And then something struck me. A game? We’d been forgetting something.
Games. Bullets that don’t kill. Robotic Cossacks. Annual revolutions. Games.
'Doctor? Spidrick?'
I guess the Doctor heard something in my voice.
'I have had a thought.'
'I gather this is an event of note?' said Spidrick. I ignored him.
'This is all fake, correct? Oh, these walls are real brick and these bars are steel, but this wasn’t built as a prison, was it?'
The Doctor shushed Spidrick. 'Go on.'
The outer door clanged open. Marchers approached. I spoke rapidly.
'What I mean is, it’s fictional, right? It’s built for people to play a game in. And who wants to play prisoner–'
The Doctor leaped to his feet. ' –if there’s no hope of escape! Unstoffe! You’re brilliant!' he said, 'Now, tap those flagstones! Spidrick, check the walls for hidden panels! I’ll inspect the sink!'
Not to blow my own stupplehorn, but I am brilliant, you know? The sink and the platform beneath pivoted to expose a dark opening, a ladder leading below. We wasted no time. I went last, replacing the sink as I went. The tunnel below, forgotten for centuries, was warm, dry and dimly lit by oil lamps. We were at its very end. Every cell, I saw, had an egress here. We stood at the bottom, grinning at the cries of consternation above.
'We’d best not linger,' cautioned Spidrick, 'they aren’t total fools.'
Judging by the rapping sounds from above, he was right. I glanced right and saw the Doctor was studying the floor. 'Look, Unstoffe,' he said. A line of royally petite footprints were clearly visible in the dust. They led to a small table at tunnel’s end and back toward the palace. They were overlaid by another, larger pair, and there were signs of a scuffle. Our equipment–my communicator, the Doctor’s Sonic, Spidrick’s gun –was arranged on the table.
'She knew we’d escape,' I said, 'and she was caught! Now we have to save her!'
'Right!' said the Doctor, and, 'Honour demands it,' said Spidrick, reaching for the gun.
'I wonder why this is still all here, though, if she was caught?' I wondered.