Second of the Raven Series and part of the Fifth Doctor Fiction collection
I watch the Doctor in his ethereally bright console room from the dark comfort of my own. I notice with distaste that he has bought a new chimp to add to his growing collection - a tall handsome youth although I can tell from his stern gaze that he is inexperienced and innocent - a very new one then? It makes me laugh at how devilishly simple it would be to destroy them all.
My TARDIS is hiding in the shadow of his own - I have only to flick a switch to time-ram him and his companions to kingdom-come... but... no... I mustn't - I want to seen pain in the Doctor's eyes... I want to see him hurt...
The Doctor agrees to show the new chimp around the universe and says he will start with the utopia of the Leovant Empire.
I laugh a little as we simultaneously set our TARDIS controls for Leovant, however I make sure I will arrive some time before the Doctor does.
***
Tegan was first out of the tiny blue box that had materialised in the crater. The crater had a radius of about two hundred metres and above her and all around her were huge clay cliffs, which she could only just see the top of. The entire landscape was red with a clay-sand type substance. The sky overhead was a brilliant greeny-blue and there were no clouds in the sky. The sun was hot although it seemed little larger than the one back home.
The others followed from the TARDIS.
"Some centre of town," began Tegan, "for all I know this could be some quarry on Earth."
"Oh Tegan, don't start, please. There's obviously been some mistake."
"Obviously."
"Well...if you'll all get back in the TARDIS, we'll try again shall we...?"
"But don't you want to know where we are?" asked the youthful Raven standing just a little too close to Nyssa for the Doctor's comfort.
"Oh...I'm sorry," said the Doctor trying to curb the small mutiny with some strong words of authority, "but there doesn't appear to be anyone to ask!"
The Doctor did not approve of Raven's relationship with Nyssa and his tone of voice was set to proclaim this to the young couple. They were getting too friendly too fast and the Doctor did not want his Nyssa getting hurt.
Raven just smiled innocently.
"Very well," said the Doctor, ramming his hat into his pocket, "Adric will you help? I want to make some soil samples. Let's do things the old-fashioned way. The sky and the gravity instruments in the TARDIS suggest that this planet is very similar to Leovant and the rock strata should give us further indication of just where we are."
Adric ran to the Doctor's side, glad he had such a powerful ally in his dislike of Raven. They walked silently to the crater wall. Tegan too wandered away from the land site, not wishing to play gooseberry to two teenage love-hearts.
The Doctor and Adric knelt next to the cliff face.
"I want you to keep your eye on Nyssa for me," said the Doctor.
"You don't trust Raven then?"
"Oh it's not that as such...I just don't want her getting hurt," replied the Doctor whilst almost absent-mindedly examining a piece of clay. He continued, "Look at the way this clay crumbles away - like sand. I've seen a similar sort of thing before - my guess would be some sort of nuclear explosive went off here."
"We could be in a war zone then?"
"Perhaps...what is certain is that this whole cliff face is unstable - we'd better get back to the TARDIS at once."
Tegan was watching a swarm of tiny black dots in the distant sky. As they glided closer, she could see that they were in fact men on some sort of flying motorbike. As they swarmed closer still, they fired tiny blue blobs randomly at the crater.
"Get down you little fool," the masculine voice came from nowhere as she was unceremoniously grabbed by the ankle and pulled down into a sandy bunker.
***
Adric had started running for the TARDIS as soon as he had seen the bikers, but the Doctor was just standing watching them. Adric ran back for the Doctor.
"We are on Leovant," mumbled the Doctor.
"What?"
"The crests on the bikes' armour - the Morton family crest - one of the leading families on Leovant."
"Very good, Doctor, but hadn't we better get out of here?"
"Oh, I don't think they'll fire at us - in my younger (or should I say older) days I was quite good friends with old Jermia Morton."
A blue bolt landed inches away from the Doctor sizzling the ground.
"Well perhaps you were right," said the Doctor as he joined Adric in a mad pelt for the TARDIS doors.
***
Looking upwards, Tegan could see Nyssa and Raven pulling each other away from the flying bikers; just as the cliff face exploded covering them and the TARDIS with debris.
She saw the Doctor and Adric run for safety, but they didn't make it either. The falling cliff face swamped them. She squealed and had a leather glove clamped over her mouth for her pains.
Shielding her eyes from the atrocities she discovered the other occupants in the trench numbered six - five men and a blonde, all wearing sand camouflaged clothing and sporting energy weapons with which they were defending themselves. Feeling rather useless, she crawled into a corner and waited for the guns and fighting to cease.
***
Brigadier Moina Celes of the Imperial Leovant Army rode in the centre of her attack squad - her subordinates providing vital shielding for her from the rebels. This was an easy fight - the army had Silicon Mortonate armour, but the rebels had only their wits.
She scanned the crater with the sensors imbedded in her helmet and finding the rebels' hiding place armed a grenade.
***
The grenade's journey was swift and well placed; Celes was well practised and rarely missed. The grenade landed mere centimetres from Tegan and started ticking.
"er...excuse me?" she tapped the man who had saved her on the shoulder.
"Shit!" he exclaimed and scooped up the bomb and ran with it from the shelter. The rebels tried to take some of the army's firepower away from him, but to no avail. A trooper shot him mercilessly in the back. He fell forward dead. Seconds later the bomb went off.
"Larna," said a young rebel to the blonde, "we can use the cover from the grenade to get underground - the blast will screen us from their instruments."
"Do it," said Larna.
She continued to fire at the armoured men on horseback - actually managing to knock one off his mechanical steed. He landed with a sickening crunch in the dust.
***
Meanwhile two of the rebels were unscrewing what appeared to Tegan to be a large dustbin lid from the sandy earth. It revealed a dark tunnel leading into the ground.
The rebels began to jump down the hole until only Tegan and the young woman called Larna were left.
"You next," ordered Larna.
"Oh no...I can't leave my friends."
"Well, whoever you are, I'm not having you compromise my safety."
She picked Tegan easily off her feet and hurled her headlong into the gloom. Larna followed, screwing the lid back in place as she did so.
"The sand'll cover our tracks, we'll be quite safe," she told Tegan.
"Look, I'm sorry about up there - I just got scared," answered Tegan.
"Garad always did have a thing for the pretty ladies - had I been in charge I would have left you for the troopers. Still, I suppose you're one of us now - we must get you...kitted...out."
A tear strolled down Larna's face.
"You were fond of Garad?" Tegan asked sympathetically.
Larna shrugged, "Not really," she said, "he was my father."
***
Brigadier Celes' scanners had come back online after the blast. They registered just four survivors - all inactive. She barked the order to land into her comm link.
By the time the Brigadier had dismounted her bike, Moltz, her young second-in-command was by her side. She looked at his young dark features - he was barely twenty but had seen enough active service to give his complexion an aged look. Still with the current number of rebel outbreaks on the capital planet, his life span - not that it mattered - was likely to place him near to middle age. Celes removed her helmet and stroked her soft brown bald head.
The portly and short Alra, her communications officer, waddled over. Celes pitied Alra; too weak to hold an important post.
The trio walked to where Sandos' broken body lay. Celes kicked the body distractedly.
"How's it look?" she asked Moltz.
"The bike's not in too bad shape; could do with a mech team looking it over though."
"Good. Alra, I shall need an extra rider from the citadel."
"Yes ma'am."
"Don't do it yet - I may have a list of things to send to the citadel."
"Very good, ma'am."
"Medic!" screamed Celes.
The team's medic rushed towards where the fallen body lay. The white masked figure knelt and felt for vital signs.
"He's dead," he said quietly.
"I can see he's dead, you fool!" exclaimed Celes.
"With respect, ma'am, what do you want me to do about it?"
"Do whatever you do when we need to bury something! Oh and see the family get notified. Send them flowers or something; nothing too flashy - he was only a junior trooper, we don't want to over do it."
"Very good ma'am."
Celes dislodged the scanner in her helmet and held it in her hand. It led Alra, Moltz and herself to where the first two actives were hiding.
She held aloft her gun whilst Moltz uncovered the young male and female.
She scanned them - they were both fertile.
"Alra, I need transport for one male and one female to the breeding colonies."
"Yes, ma'am."
The young man was brushing himself down, "Look this had nothing to do with us, so if you could just..."
"Listen, you rebel scum, don't ever think of lying to a Imperial Leovant Officer again - if the empire didn't need more patters of tiny feet, I would have wrung your scrawny neck by now."
"Oh Raven!" This was the woman - a very weak specimen.
"Now just hang on..." began the male.
"Listen, to me, little man, you don't need your tongue to make babies, so if you open your mouth again, I shall have one of my troopers cut it out."
With that the little band moved on to where the second two actives had emerged from the sand fall.
One was a blond man in a beige coat. His companion was younger and wore yellow.
The older one stuck out his hand at Celes, "Good morning, I'm the Doctor and this is Adric, Miss...er...?"
"I am Brigadier Moina Celes of the Imperial Leovant Army, but you need not address me at all," she cocked her weapon threateningly.
Nevertheless the Doctor continued, "Then we are on Leovant - I thought this planet was a peaceful one and where are the bustling market places, the idyllic gardens, the...?"
"All destroyed by the war as well you know, and we're better off without them so don't try any of your conversion tactics on me matey."
The Doctor spoke again, "You know, I used to know a Brigadier once, he wasn't nearly as nasty as you. You should take a page out of your sergeant's book, I can see you're not really a people person."
Moltz smiled to himself out of Celes' view, but she knew that he was all the same.
Celes replied, "My sergeant has a loose tongue."
The smile snapped from Moltz's face.
Celes raised her scanning device at the silent captive - he was fertile. She raised it to the second also, but was stopped by Moltz.
"It might be better not to send these two to the breeding colonies ma'am."
"Go on."
"It would be useful to us to have someone to interrogate and it would do no good to citizen morale to emphasise how fertile our little rebellion is."
"That is treasonable! We are required to send all fertile captives to the colonies."
"Yes ma'am."
Celes dragged Moltz aside.
"Yet it is only Alra who knows that this one is fertile - it would be a shame if some sort of accident were to happen to dear Alra."
"I'll see what I can do, ma'am."
"Very good Moltz - you're not just a pretty face you know."
"Yes ma'am, I know."
***
Tegan was led for what seemed like miles of near dark tunnels that smelled as if they were sewage tunnels. She was sure a rat-like creature ran across her foot at one point.
The tunnel led eventually to a large clean bright well-lit room with several doors leading off from it. It reminded Tegan of the TARDIS.
It was here, Tegan was told, that the little squad of rebels had made their home.
Whilst the others went about their chores, Larna led Tegan to a small plush seating area.
"Home sweet home," said Tegan.
"This building is part of the sewage network for the old city - I mean was. The city was destroyed in the war."
"The war?"
"You're really not from round here, are you?"
"We're from off-world. I and my friends travel across galaxies. My friend the Doctor said Leovant was a friendly empire."
"It was. This planet held a beautiful mass-city, the centre of a vast trading empire. It was ruled by three households who formed a senate. There were always squabbles between them, but these were increased into war when a strange off-worlder came to the planet. The Morton's won of-course, they had traded in weaponry before the war and so were much better equipped than the other two. Those who refused to bow down to the Morton family were branded traitors and these were the ancestors of the rebellion. The Mortons, who now just call themselves the Imperial Family, exploded nuclear bombs in parts of the city to catch the rebels. They got the city, but not us. We hope for freedom one day. The nuclear war also caused mass infertility amongst the citizens. Several breeding colonies were formed where fertile slaves, rebels and captives are sent to create new generations for the empire. I expect this is where your friends have been sent."
"And you?"
"The Imperial Family is unfit to rule - in forty years they've turned a bustling metropolis into a dust heap. I, like my father and grandfather, have vowed to stop them."
"You must've loved your father very much."
Larna ignored this, not wishing to appear weak to an off-worlder. Instead she said, "There are three breeding colonies - one of the other rebel teams are leading an assault on one of them tomorrow - you might be lucky..."
"I'd like to go."
***
The transport was cold, damp and smelled of urine. For all Adric could see it was little more than a rusty tin-can welded to a pair of wings. The Doctor seemed very quiet and so he started a conversation:
"Doctor?"
"Yes?"
"You said that this was Leovant. And yet it's nothing like your description of it."
"I know."
"That's worrying you?"
"Yes. I think, Adric, someone or something has been rewriting time itself."
***
After a hour or so the transport landed with an uncomfortable lurch. Adric and the Doctor were marched by armed troopers from a landing bay through lots of dark damp corridors. Adric noted grimly that whoever had been responsible for the construction of the transport was also the interior designer for the building that they were now in.
Presently they reached a small room with a desk, some communication equipment and three cells. The first cell contained a very old man asleep on a stained mattress, the others were empty. The Doctor and Adric were shoved into the third cell and a guard turned a heavy key in the lock. He walked away.
"How long will we have to stay here?" shouted the Doctor.
The jailer said nothing. As the other guards left the room, he sat behind the desk and began filling in paperwork.
Adric walked around the cell. It was cold, damp and smelt of urine.
***
Raven and Nyssa were marched aboard the clean white corridors of an Imperial shuttlecraft. They were taken to one end of the craft where a blank white door slid open. Their guard gestured that they should enter. The cell was really just a converted storage area. It was simple, but clean. Nyssa sat on the single bed and put her head in her hands.
Raven sat next to her and placed his arms around her.
"Are you okay?" he asked.
"Yes, I was just thinking..."
"What?"
"Well that woman said she was from the Imperial Leovant What-ja-ma-call-it."
"So?"
"That means we are on Leovant."
"Or somewhere where Leovant has jurisdiction - let's get our facts straight."
"Even so the Doctor said that Leovant was prosperous and friendly - do prosperous and friendly places have breeding colonies for captives?"
"So you're saying that Leovant has suddenly been changed by some mysterious event that altered its timeline?"
"Well...yes."
***
The Doctor and Adric had been in the prison cell for what seemed like several hours. The Doctor had been trying to convert their single guard to their cause for the majority of that time. The guard just looked bored. The Doctor was making an almighty din, banging on about something called 'The Geneva Convention' or something - it was giving Adric a nasty headache.
A greying man dressed in scarlet robes entered the jail, accompanying him were two armoured guards. He was followed by Brigadier Celes, now wearing a dashing blue uniform instead of her armour. The jailer jumped to attention, but was ignored by both Celes and the stranger.
By Celes' stance, Adric could tell that the robed man was of great importance and she feared him.
The robed man began to speak, "Yes these will do nicely. Very nicely indeed."
"With respect, Lord Bashine," began Celes, "I was going to question these two. They may have important tactical knowledge about the rebellion."
"The Imperial Household is still running a skeleton shift after the...er...accident. I don't need to remind you that as chief of that household, I have first choice of prisoners - besides it will encourage you to get out there and catch some more criminals."
"Sir."
"Very good, see that you do," Bashine spoke to one of his guards, "take these two aboard the shuttle - the Emperor will want to inspect them at his earliest opportunity."
Adric and the Doctor were led back through the labyrinth and into a second docking bay, larger than the first. Here a beautifully crafted white shuttle lay, into which they were led on board.
From what Adric could see the shuttle was laid out in a simple design. A corridor ran the length of the ship. In the middle of this were two airlocks - it was through the port side airlock that he and the Doctor had been led. At the top of the corridor was the flight deck, which Adric could see through the open door, contained two more armoured guards. At the base of the corridor was a small hold, which had been converted, into a cell for transporting prisoners, with the addition of a mouldy looking bunk bed and a chamber pot. On the floor was a jug of water and two glasses.
When the guard had left them, the Doctor poured himself a glass and offered the other to Adric. He took it smiling.
Presently the shuttle's main drive started up.
***
The rebels provided Tegan with nourishment and a set of clothes bearing the emblem of the group. After this she had a sleep until Vedex, a young man with fiery red hair, woke her and offered to give her some weaponry instruction.
Later when they all sat around the dinner table eating bowls of green gunge, Tegan recounted her latest adventures travelling with the Doctor. She carefully managed to avoid the question of time-travel by severe editing.
After the food things had been cleared away, the group taught Tegan a card game and they played this until they were ready to sleep. Tegan slept well as she knew the men of the group were taking shifts to guard the base.
After a simple breakfast, Larna, Vedex and Biltreed - another male although older than Vedex - led Tegan through the sewers to meet with the rebel faction who were to raid the breeding colony of WGC. Biltreed explained in his slow deep voice that many of this faction's people were taken there after a chance encounter with a squad of Imperial Troops.
The journey was made more pleasant than the last as the rebels had rigged up a kind of buggy that could skim along the curved sewer tunnels. Using this, the trip took only about half an hour and at the end of it, Tegan was introduced to Zedec who, she learnt, was Larna's uncle and leader of the rebel group who were to storm WGC. Zedec looked deeply saddened when he heard the news of his brother's death.
Tegan was kitted out with a combat suit and weapon, which was forced upon her when she initially refused it. She was given yet more practise with it and fed and watered.
She then joined the march along more sewage corridors, which led, she was told, into the Imperial Palace's ventilation system. From this, the platoon were told by Zedec that they could gain access to the docking bays and steal a shuttle, which would take them to WGC.
The plan sounded a little ambitious, but right now it was all Tegan had.
***
After their very lengthy shuttle ride, Raven and Nyssa were led through deep carpeted corridors and into a wood panelled office where a large balding man sat writing behind a heavy oak desk.
Eventually he looked up.
"Welcome to Omega - Gamma - Chi," he spoke in a rich voice as if they had entered some kind of fairground attraction, "Don't look glum, my little things. Be thankful. If you were infertile you would probably have been shot. Here... Here you can have a life of luxury - if, and I do mean if, you behave yourselves."
He pushed his chubby right hand across the desk and shook hands with them both.
"What's going to happen to us?" asked Raven.
"You mean you don't know? I thought the activities of the breeding colonies were broadcast throughout the empire - even to rebels."
"We're not even from the empire. We were wrongfully arrested."
"Still keeping up the charade? Very wise. Very wise. You will be taken to a breeding room, my dears, where you will have just a week to become pregnant. Then the young lady will be sent to the maternity hospital and the young man will be assigned another partner."
"And if we refuse?" asked Nyssa as bravely as she could.
"You will be destroyed. Now if you'll excuse me, I am rather busy."
***
The rebel group crouched in a narrow shaft that opened into one of the Imperial Palace's main shuttlebays. Zedec was in front. He had positioned Tegan near the back - Larna had said that she was a squealer and although he wanted to help the poor girl, he didn't want his mission compromised by her.
After a while a shuttle landed. Zedec watched silently as two prisoners - a man and a boy both in hideous shades of yellow - were escorted from the craft. Zedec waited for the various Imperial staff to leave the room, until a single technician remained. The technician was busying himself checking the craft's hulls for cracks.
Zedec waited until the young man's back was turned to the grating and then produced a magnetic control device from his belt. He clipped this to the grating and it slid silently open. Zedec produced a knife from his belt and flung it at the technician.
On hearing the knife whistle through the air the technician turned, but too late. The knife struck through his heart before he had a chance to scream.
Zedec jumped out of the ventilation shaft. The others followed suit.
Unclipping his gun, Zedec trained it on the door whilst the others started up the shuttle. Tegan stood aghast looking at the dead body.
"Was that necessary?" asked the girl.
"Yes. He'd have done the same to me."
"He's a technician, not a warrior."
"So?"
Their little discourse was interrupted by Roner who gave a big thumbs up signal from the airlock of the shuttle. Zedec dragged the girl to it and told her to get in.
Once in the shuttle, it fired at the big hangar doors. They exploded in electric blue flames.
The explosion alerted some of the guards outside and they came running in. Leaning out of the airlock door, Zedec picked two or three of them off before the shuttle left the hangar and the palace behind them.
When he was sure that they were safe, Zedec triggered the locking mechanism on the airlock door. He told his men to get some rest. The real fighting would start soon enough.
***
The breeding chamber was like a huge well decorated hotel suite. It possessed en suite facilities and a hot tub. A huge bed almost filled the main room and there was a fresh bouquet of flowers. French windows led out into an outdoor garden which was surrounded by a large wooden fence.
In fact the only threatening thing about the room was the vast abundance of security cameras that weren't even trying to be inconspicuous.
***
His Imperial Majesty was bored. He listened in his throne room while yet another jumped up official gave news of more rebel attacks and asked him the right way to proceed. It was a joke. He wasn't even truly in power. Instead an ear-piece disguised as ornate jewellery connected him to his mother-in-law's private viewing suite. Hidden cameras throughout the grand throne room meant that she was the true power behind the throne. He was only a figurehead. A bored figurehead.
He was eighteen. He should be enjoying life in all it's fruitfulness not ordering troops on suicidal missions in a absurd civil war which, if he was to believe the textbooks, started because the price of fruitcake was too high. He was dressed absurdly. His so-called subordinates on the throne room floor wore heavy robes, whereas he wore a simply loincloth coupled with heavy gold jewellery. He longed for a way out.
The next hearing was for Lord Bashine who had secured some more slaves from the military. There were two of them and sadly they were both male. Bashine was detailing their apparent abilities.
"They can read and write and..."
"Yes, but can they do laundry and scrub floors, Bashine?"
"Evidently your highness. They have hands and feet, do they not?
The taller slave spoke, "Look you seem like a sensible chap. There's been a mix-up; you see we're not criminals at all."
This heresy hushed the courtiers with a loud gasp.
"Enough, Bashine, take these two ruffians to the kitchens!"
"You know," continued the blond man, "I thought that Leovant was a civilised empire. I was here a while back and the ground was fertile and the empire was as rich as the Anubi fruit that was grown in this very palace's gardens."
"You speak of a time before The Coming, yet you are not more than thirty years old?"
"Oh, appearances can be deceptive - for instance you would appear to be in charge of the empire - yet that badly hidden ear-phone and those cameras tell me that someone else is really in command. I saw a similar thing when I was last in China..."
"Silence!" roared the Chief Usher at the feet of the throne.
"Tell him about The Coming and then get rid of him!" hissed the Imperial Mother in the Emperor's ear-piece.
"Very well, I shall humour you this once, although I have no evidence to suggest that you are not a rebel, I like to keep a happy household. The god came to my family shortly before the war and told us the error of our ways. We should be more competitive he said. Aggressive feelings occurred between the three great families of Leovant a war occurred and the Morton family, with the knowledge the god passed on, came out on top."
"You don't sound happy about that."
"My mother-in-law would tell you different, but the nuclear devices used by both sides during the war rendered Leovant infertile. What is the point of being Lord of dust?"
"Quite, quite," murmured the blond prisoner. "And what does that ornate necklace symbolise?"
"This is a pig's heart, by wearing the heart near my own, it symbolises the link between the god and myself. It is my divine right to rule, because I have two hearts like the great deity."
"Two hearts," said Adric, "A timelord?"
"Tell me what does this god look like?" asked the Doctor
"Turn around. His likeness is given by the statue."
The Doctor's jaw went so far south he could have swallowed the giant statue in one. The statue was of an elderly Edwardian gentleman. In fact it was the very likeness of his first self.
"You seem shocked?" asked the Emperor.
"I...I. So you believe this...this war is the right course of action do you?" asked the Doctor recovering quickly.
"I...I don't know."
There was another gasp from the courtiers. The chief priest claimed that the Emperor had a sickness of the mind and commanded that the chamber be cleared at once. The officials left immediately leaving only the Doctor, Adric and the Emperor.
***
Nyssa was lying on the huge soft bed thinking about the previous hours' events as Raven showered next door. She smirked. She had been in much worse situations and a baby would be so welcome. She could continue the Traken line. And Raven was the perfect father. And of course it could always be much worse. It could have been Adric...
***
A large old woman entered followed by two guards bearing weapons.
"I've had enough of this - some people talk too much for their own good."
"This is my mother-in-law," said the Emperor almost apologetically.
"Shut up!" she ordered the Emperor.
"Kill him!" she ordered her guards.
The Doctor had been here before and so it was almost not a surprise when he opened his eyes to find that he had not been obliterated.
Where the Emperor had been was a smouldering mass of ash.
"Put your hands up," she ordered the Doctor and Adric, who did as they were told.
The Imperial Mother took her guards weapons and aiming them fired. The two guards were destroyed even more thoroughly than their Emperor had been.
She hooked the guards' weapons upon the up-stretched arms of Adric and the Doctor and left the chamber. Presently an alarm sounded and the Doctor and Adric were surrounded by Imperial guards, twenty energy weapons trained at their hearts.
A bald man in golden armour walked in followed by the Imperial Mother.
"Kill them!" the man ordered.
"Wait, Goron," said the Imperial Mother.
"What?"
"It may be better to make them stand trial for their crimes. If you shoot them down now, questions may be asked about your competency. The Emperor was left alone in his own throne room with two known dangerous criminals."
"And what's in it for you?"
"These two killed my beloved son-in-law. I want to see them die from a more painful death than you had planned. I want to see them hurt."
"Very well, they shall stand trial," said Goron through gritted teeth.
The Imperial Mother, satisfied, walked away.
Goron announced to the prisoners, "You will stand trial for what you have done."
"Good. Perhaps we will finally get some justice around here," said Adric.
Goron ignored this and told the guards to take them to the dungeons.
The Doctor spoke, "Do you know how many prison cells we have been in since we landed on this planet? I am getting rather sick of this! We are visitors to your planet and yet you treat us like criminals."
"Enough, take them away!"
***
Nyssa clutched the soft sheets around herself as the naked and dripping wet Raven stalked in from the bathing room. He climbed in beside her without bothering to dry himself. He kissed her lips.
***
When the guards had left the Doctor and Adric in yet another dingy smelly cell, the Doctor's demeanour changed visibly. Head in hands, he sat down heavily on the bed.
"What's the matter?" asked Adric concerned.
"Their god, he's..."
"A timelord - that's interesting. I think that could account for the changes between the Leovant that you remember and the one we are actually in. If he had changed the timeline somehow..."
"Just...Just be quiet a minute Adric."
"Well, sorry...I..."
"It's me."
"What?"
"Their god, it's me."
"What!?"
"Their god is...was my first incarnation."
"And...you caused all this!?"
"I...can't remember. I don't remember being here then. But I must have been...I'm...I'm sorry Adric."
***
The shuttle landed in WGC's main shuttle-bay, lasers blazing. Three guards were killed instantly, a fourth by Zedec when he led the rebels off the shuttle and into the colony.
The rebels ran through the carpeted corridors slaughtering anyone in uniform, but Tegan didn't let herself notice this butchery.
Through a one way viewing panel, she caught sight of Nyssa and Raven dressed in black kimonos and interlocked in each other's arms. Overjoyed, she began banging upon the panel, but she was scooped forwards as a laser bolt blistered the wall behind her. The guards were fighting back.
The attacker moved forward and cut down Tegan's rescuer where he stood. He fell against the blistered wall creating a corpse shaped hole.
Tegan looked around. Her rebel friends were nearing the end of the corridor and she had mislaid her gun. Her attacker raised his gun to fire.
***
Zedec gritted his yellowing teeth. His men had control of the entire colony, but this was nothing without the control suite. Unfortunately, the colony's governor and technicians had barricaded themselves in there. Zedec's men now had the huge task of blasting their way through the armour plating.
Zedec's concern was that the Imperial fleet had already been signalled. They would get here in five minutes, whereas the armoured door would take six.
***
The guards smiled as they led Adric and the Doctor through seemingly miles of palace corridors. It seemed the outcome of their trial was almost certain.
***
Brigadier Celes watched grimly at the side of General Geraine on the roof of the Imperial Citadel as a vertical mile away, the twin funeral of Sandos and Alra was taking place.
A young communications officer stepped from the lift behind her.
"Ma'am, you're wanted in court."
"Yes...?"
"The trial of...er... the two slaves you captured."
"Trial?"
"I know nothing more ma'am."
"Will you excuse me sir?" sighed the Brigadier.
Geraine nodded briefly.
***
The Doctor and Adric were led into a small darkened room a lot like a cupboard. From here they would be able to hear all that happened in the courtroom. Conversely the court would only be able to hear them when they wished.
***
Raven ran through the hole in the wall and, scooping up Tegan's fallen ally's weapon, fired at the guard's chest. It exploded before the shocked guard could fire at Tegan.
Tegan led Raven and Nyssa past the heaped corpses to the shuttlebay. Raven held one hand over Nyssa's eyes to shield her from the grizzly scenes. The other he used to hold the gun to protect Tegan and Nyssa from Imperial troops.
***
When Zedec's technician had cut a hole through the door, his team placed the barrels of their weapons in the hole and fired.
When the screaming had stopped and he was sure that everyone was dead, Zedec stepped through the opening and thumbed the control that would release all the breeders.
Zedec's men then assisted the freed men and women in their flight to the shuttlecraft. In the shuttle bay, a waiting Tegan helped them aboard and showed them to the storage area where they were to spend the flight.
***
Celes entered the vast hearing chamber. It was decorated throughout with an absurd amount of gold and red cloth.
In the centre of the room was the judge, Geren Molok, bedecked in finery. He sat on a huge gold throne, which sat on a circular podium, which rotated at a rate of one revolution per hour.
Celes was last into the chamber and so the hearing began.
***
Tegan, Nyssa and Raven were discussing their previous activities amongst the throng of ex-breeders when the shuttle lurched violently to one side.
Scrabbling to her feet, Tegan went off to the control deck promising to discover the problem with the shuttle.
***
Through the transparent window of the cockpit, she saw white.
In front of her Zedec and Maxis, the pilot, were scrabbling frantically at the controls. They were spouting technobable at a rate at which even the Doctor would have trouble understanding. Tegan understood none of it, but she knew it couldn't be good.
Suddenly a panel in front of Maxis burst into flames. Quick as a flash, Tegan grabbed what looked most like a fire extinguisher and fired it at the burning mess.
The foam satisfactorily put out the fire. By way of thanks Maxis explained that they were under attack by an Imperial Frigate.
"Well...can't we go to maximum thrust or something - catch them off guard?" asked Tegan
"She's got a point Maxis."
"If we hit a planet...?"
"Then we'd be no more dead than if we stick around here." Saying this, Zedec pushed a control on the panel in front of him to it's maximum amount and the shuttle lurched forward.
***
The trial began with a baritone voice repeating a carefully crafted version of events leading to the untimely death of the Emperor. The Doctor and Adric were both asked individually how they pleaded - they both answered 'not guilty' - there was a mass shocked gasp and then the dark cupboard like room was silent for a while.
***
Guilforth smiled. After the death of the Emperor he was the most powerful man in the empire, as right hand man to the Imperial Mother and one of Leovant's top lawyers. He would be branded a hero after successfully winning the case against the Emperor's foes.
He had arranged that the defendants would not be able to hear his statement of prosecution. This was only fair. The guilty pair should not be allowed to prepare for their defence.
***
"Prisoners," boomed the voice once more, "Do you have anything to say in your defence?"
"Well... yes," said the Doctor.
"Go on."
"Have you actually considered the fact that it was not possible for us to have killed the emperor...?"
"What do you mean?"
"Well there were two of us and three of them and they were armed and we weren't."
"Plus the Imperial Mother," added Adric.
"That's four."
"He lies," said a new voice, "The Imperial Mother knew nothing of this."
"Let him finish," said the first, "My court will be a just court."
"Well, your honour," continued the Doctor, "how could we have fought our way against three able bodied men when two of them had guns?"
"The guards did not enter the chamber until they heard the gunfire," said the second voice.
"Oh I think that's a little unlikely don't you?" answered the Doctor, "For starters how did we kill the Emperor with weapons that were not even in the chamber yet? And if the Emperor was being attacked, I think more than two of his guards would turn up to defend him. No, the only logical and true explanation was that the Imperial Mother killed her son-in-law and tried to land the blame on two innocent off-worlders. She had motive and opportunity and ability."
There was then a brief silence before the noise of a hundred voices talking at once overlapped with several calling 'blasphemy' and others calling for order.
***
Tegan noted with a grimace that decelerating on an Imperial Shuttle was a lot like accelerating on an Imperial Shuttle. Both times, she fell heavily against the wall of the cockpit.
The frigate had left the view port. A huge dust ridden planet had replaced it.
"Leovant," gaped maxis.
Maxis and Zedec once again started spouting technical jargon to each other. However Tegan didn't need that handy degree in rocket science to understand that they were going to crash.
***
The chamber erupted into anarchy. Guilforth desperately tried to gain control of the proceedings and some respect for his evil mistress.
When glances reached his area of the vast room, he thought for a second that he had won at least the attention of the court.
But the gazes were of astonishment and fear. Turning, Guilforth discovered the Imperial Mother holding up the court with some kind of small energy weapon.
A guard lurched towards her. She fired the weapon mercilessly. The guard vanished. Upon the floor was a perfect miniature man in Imperial uniform.
"Anyone else want to play hero?" asked the Imperial Mother backing from the chamber. "Thought not."
***
The door to Adric and the Doctor's dark hearing chamber swung wide. Their guard could be seen running down the long corridor.
"Was it something I said?" asked the Doctor. "Come on!"
The pair set off at a trot towards the throne room.
***
Tegan was handed the ship's intercom mike as she crouched ready for impact:
"Ladies and Gentlemen, as you may have gathered from the small amounts of turbulence, we are attempting an emergency landing. The cabin crew would be grateful if you could assume the foetal position and remain calm."
***
The Doctor and Adric re-entered the crime scene. There was a dearth of native Leovantians.
"Something's changed," said Adric.
"The statue!"
They ran over to where the huge statue of the Doctor's first incarnation had stood. In its place were a bundle of clothes and a rubber suit looking remarkably similar to the Imperial Mother.
There was a distant whining noise.
"Doctor what's going on?" asked Adric.
"I don't know, but I'm beginning to understand."
The whining noise was getting louder.
"But statues that size don't just disappear."
"Did it occur to you to ask how they managed to get it in here in the first place?"
"Well maybe they built the palace after they put the statue in."
"Yes...or maybe it was a TARDIS."
"A...TARDIS?"
"Yes that would explain the fiddling with time and why I don't remember doing it."
"The Master?"
"Probably."
The noise was now at an almost unbearable level.
"Run!" shouted the Doctor.
***
The glistening white crumpled shuttle broke through the roof of the palace and screeched finally to a halt less than a metre away from where the Doctor and Adric were hiding behind the enormous throne.
The hatch door opened and Tegan stepped out.
The Doctor ran forward, "Tegan!" he shouted.
And she hugged him.
***
Whilst the rest of the rebels helped with the revolution that was going on in the palace, Tegan led the Doctor, Adric, Nyssa, Raven and the refugees from WGC to the safe house in the sewer system. The journey was shortened by the exchange of the occurrences of the previous day.
At the safe house, the TARDIS crew rested for a few hours before continuing to the site where they had left the TARDIS. Armed with shovels, it was still sunset before they had removed enough sand-clay to open one of the battered blue doors.
Once inside, the Doctor set the co-ordinates that would plunge them back into the vortex.
The others left to freshen up, but the Doctor called Nyssa aside.
"Yes?" she asked.
"I want you to help me track another TARDIS."
"Oh?"
"See that orange light in front of you?"
"No...yes."
"Tell me when it flickers red."
"Okay."
The Doctor fiddled at his side of the console and said as if making polite conversation, "So...er...Raven and you were sent to the breeding colonies...did you...er...breed?"
"It could have been Adric."
"That's a no, right?"
"I'm not pregnant, if that's what you're worried about."
That hadn't even crossed the Doctor's mind, but before he could say so, Nyssa continued, "I really don't see that it's any of your business. And why would I want to help you settle another of your petty squabbles with another timelord? After all, that's what killed Tegan's aunt and my... father. Someone you'll never come close to replacing!"
"Oh Nyssa," said the Doctor as she slammed out of the room.
The Doctor worrying about Nyssa ceased momentarily when he found what he was looking for and, with a grim smile, he initiated the time ram.
***
The Master chuckles with glee as he sets the co-ordinates for Leovant.
But suddenly a proximity alarm sounds and he is flung across his control room as his TARDIS breaks through the wall of the vortex. As he steadies his craft, it makes a crash dive towards the planet Earth.
Emergency materialisation causes the Master to fall once again from his chair. Rising again he finds his TARDIS is too crippled to return to the vortex.
He is not sure how the Doctor discovered him nor how this happened, but he is sure he will get his revenge!
***
The TARDIS materialised in the middle of the bustling central market of Leovant. The Doctor stepped out pleased as punch that everything was back to normal. The Master had once again been stopped.
When his companions eventually joined him, they laughed hysterically for the Doctor had parked his TARDIS in the middle of an ornamental fountain and was so pleased with himself that he had failed to notice the warm waters lapping at his feet.
Even Nyssa alighted from her grump and joined in the brief water fight that continued until they were asked to stop by Senior Market Security Officer Moina Celes.
