Transcript of ‘The Sevenfold Crown’

[Scorpio flight deck]

SLAVE 

Visual contact: Federation guard ship.

SOOLIN 

Let me see it. [she looks at the screen] How long have we got?

SLAVE 

Within firing range in one minute 45 seconds. Hostile changing course to intercept.

SOOLIN 

[opening comms] Tarrant! We’ve been spotted. We’ve got to bring the others up and get out of here fast!

TARRANT 

[over comms, sound of hammering in background] Nearly there. Coupla minutes.

SOOLIN  

Make it one or we’re dead!

FED SHIP 

[hailing them] Wanderer class ship, identify yourself and give the password.

SOOLIN 

Space freighter Taurus to guard ship. We need supplies. Can you tell us if there’s a commercial depot on this planet? Over.

FED SHIP 

I say again, identify yourself. Give your identification code.

SOOLIN 

Oh, ah, yes, yes of course, now...where did I put the ship’s papers... [she rustles some papers] Um, give me a moment. It’s been a long trip and the skipper’s not feeling so good. If you ask me, it’s his own fault, it’s that—

FED SHIP 

This is an official warning. If you do not identify yourself in accordance with regulations, you will be considered hostile and destroyed. You have one minute.

SLAVE 

Would it be helpful if I gave you a countdown, mistress?

SOOLIN 

TARRANT!

TARRANT 

Yeah, yeah, nearly there.

SLAVE 

[at the same time] 60...59...58...57...

[Servalan’s quarters]

AVON 

Got it.

VILA 

About time too.

AVON 

The simplest way is often the best way. Just remember—anything she throws at us is only an illusion, right?

VILA 

Right! [more uncertainly] Right.

SERVALAN 

And what are you proposing to do? Your gun is useless and your body—

AVON 

Why do I need a weapon? I have torn out the throat of a tiger with this very hand.

SERVALAN 

Have you indeed? Then show me.

[a tiger appears and growls]

AVON 

Illusion. Give me the stone. [he grabs Servalan by the throat]

SERVALAN 

Oh...if... [gasps]

VILA 

Don’t strangle her, Avon. On second thoughts...

[the door opens]

SERVALAN 

Oh, Lieutenant Vledka. What very good timing.

VLEDKA 

Hands high, the pair of you.

VILA 

You can’t fool me, you’re only a hallucination.

VLEDKA 

What?

SERVALAN 

No! Don’t kill him!

VILA 

You see, nothing but a— [Vledka hits him] Oh! [he falls]

AVON 

Drop your gun or the commissioner is dead.

SERVALAN 

Ohh...uh.

SOOLIN 

[over bracelet comms] Avon, Vila, I’m bringing you up.

AVON 

No!

[they teleport]

[Scorpio flight deck]

SLAVE 

...ten...nine...eight... [continues to count down during following]

VILA 

[moans in pain]

AVON 

What d’you think you’re doing?

SOOLIN 

Quiet! Stand by for maximum thrust.

AVON 

Tarrant! Give me a hand with Vila.

FED SHIP 

Identify now or I fire.

SLAVE 

...three...two...one... [drive starts] ...zero.

SOOLIN 

Slave. Status report.

SLAVE 

Hostile beyond contact range. No sign of pursuit.

SOOLIN 

We’ve lost them.

DAYNA 

Well done.

AVON 

[sarcastically] Well done.

SOOLIN 

Whew!

AVON 

Do you realise that I had Servalan in my hands—literally?

TARRANT 

A lot of use that would have been without Scorpio, or were you thinking of settling down on Furno?

SOOLIN 

Slave, return to base.

SLAVE 

Yes, mistress.

VILA 

[moans]

DAYNA 

What happened to Vila?

VILA 

Oh, that was a terrible dream. Ooh! My head...hang on a moment!

AVON 

We didn’t even get the stone.

DAYNA 

The stone?

VILA 

The stone, yeah. It’s all coming back. Yes—Servalan’s psionic gizmo. Ooh! [mutters] Some illusion, that was.

AVON 

For one moment I had in my grasp the key to our future, a future free from Servalan with the Federation defeated. Now, thanks to your crass incompetence—

SOOLIN 

Oh! Thank you!

AVON 

—we don’t even know where she’s heading.

VILA 

Oh yes, we do. [he pulls out some papers]

AVON 

What’s that you’ve got?

VILA 

One of the copies of that professor fellow’s book of words. I thought it might come in useful, so I nicked it while you were having your first little tete a tete with Servalan. Ooh! It had better be worth it.

[Xenon base]

AVON 

He must have told her...Vila, would it be too much to ask you to finish your dinner at the table? You’ve done nothing but eat ever since we got back to base.

VILA 

[mouth full] Fear makes me hungry.

AVON 

As I was saying, the professor must have told Servalan the name of the planet before he came into the room, it certainly isn’t in his notes. We’ve got to get there before she does. If she lays her hands on that diadem...

TARRANT 

So, what did you hear him tell her?

AVON 

Very little. Where the stone came from, its powers, his devotion to our friend.

VILA 

He did say the name of the bloke who wears the crown thing, um...King Billabong or something?

AVON 

Gheblakon, yes, though how that helps... Mean anything to anybody?

TARRANT 

Not me.

DAYNA 

No.

AVON 

Soolin?

SOOLIN 

Never heard of him.

VILA 

Why don’t you ask your clever friend?

AVON 

Orac? Because I know quite well what it’ll say. We should be bright enough to work it out for ourselves.

DAYNA 

No harm in trying.

AVON 

[inserts Orac’s key] Orac. Scan this text and tell us to which planet in this galaxy it refers.

ORAC 

A simple matter of elementary general knowledge and primitive reasoning will give you all the possible answers.

AVON 

Which are?

ORAC 

I was not designed to play children’s games. Do not waste my time.

AVON 

You see?

TARRANT 

Wretched thing. Why can’t it behave like an ordinary computer?

VILA 

It’s only human after all.

AVON 

[sarcastically] Ha ha.

DAYNA 

But that’s the point. He is partly human. I mean, he’s been designed and programmed to react like a human. Isn’t that right—dear Orac?

ORAC 

That is correct.

DAYNA 

[as if to a small child] And you’re so very, very clever. You must be the cleverest computer in the whole of the known universe.

ORAC 

Why do you tell me this? I already know it to be true.

SOOLIN 

You misunderstand her, Orac. Dayna is saying that because you are so clever, you overestimate the abilities of our species. We really are very stupid, you know.

ORAC 

That I also know to be true. Very well.

DAYNA 

Yes!

SOOLIN 

[satisfied sigh]

ORAC 

The references to piracy, to the sovereign lords, to the date of regaining access to space after the great imperial war, these inexorably point to a mere handful of planets, some two dozen, scattered though all sectors. These are Illanik, Hethbrau, Torella, Spontlo—

AVON 

Yes, all right, all right. The present king’s name is Gheblakon. Does that help?

ORAC 

I despair. Of course it does. A name of such obvious derivation. The family of languages found on the rim of the second sector retains common roots. ‘Ghebla’: iron or more rarely, ‘bronze’. ‘Kon’, a shortened form of ‘ukon’ or ‘urkon’: ‘human being’. Hence, Gheblakon, the man of iron, a typical primitive formation found universally—

AVON 

But where?

DAYNA 

Mm?

AVON 

Where can we find this Gheblakon, King Gheblakon?

ORAC 

If you will allow me to complete my sentence. A typical primitive formation, as I was about to say, found universally in underdeveloped planets, such as Torella.

TARRANT 

Torella? The holiday planet?

[Fairground on Torella, the cries of sideshow barkers]

BARKER 1 

Blood pies!

BARKER 2 

Candy corpses!

BARKER 3 

[unintelligible, possibly not Terran]

BARKER 4 

Come and ride the pirate rocket! Join the fearless buccaneers as they rip the defenceless women once more from the arms of their menfolk.

BARKER 5 

[at the same time] Only ten trids to see the peepshow.

BARKER 6 

A palpitating plenitude of pendulous pulchritude. Now you, sir. You look like a gentleman of taste and discernment. I’ve got a special presentation just right for you, sir. A bit more juicy and interactive, ha ha, if you know what I mean.

AVON 

Thank you, no, I’m a little pressed for time.

BARKER 6 

Please yourself. Come and see the peepshow...

AVON 

[opening bracelet comms, speaking quietly] Scorpio, Scorpio, do you copy?

DAYNA 

[over comms] I copy, Avon.

AVON 

Don’t send the others down yet, Dayna, I’ve arrived in the middle of a tourist area. Luckily there’s such a crowd, nobody noticed me. I’m now going down an alley. I’m behind the show booths. Piles of garbage, swarms of dung flies, and I just saw something very like a rat with six legs. There’s nobody about. It’s safe to bring the others down now.

DAYNA 

Stand by.

[Tarrant teleports]

TARRANT 

What a stink!

AVON 

Well, it’s not the odour of sanctity, I can assure you of that. Where are the others?

TARRANT 

The teleport’s still playing up. Slave’s going on about overloaded circuits but he hasn’t a notion how to fix it, so Dayna’s sending us down one by one.

[Soolin teleports]

SOOLIN 

Made it, just. Oh, it smells like a cesspit!

[Vila flickers in and out of existence]

VILA 

[at first, unintelligible fragments of words, then, cutting in and out:] What’s going on? Can’t you fix it? [arrives properly] That was horrible. I’m not missing any bits, am I?

TARRANT 

Not noticeably.

VILA 

It was like coming down in a falling lift that wouldn't stop at any floor.

DAYNA 

Vila. Vila. Do you copy? Have you made it?

VILA 

Yeah, all in one piece. Bar my stomach which is somewhere near re-entry at a rough guess.

DAYNA 

Goodbye then. Have a good holiday all of you. And try to be good while mummy’s away. Out.

AVON 

Right, you two. Got your money?

SOOLIN 

Six thousand apiece. I’d feel happier if I had a gun.

VILA 

Me too.

AVON 

How many tourists carry guns? You’ll just have to rely on your wits, no doubt an alien concept to you, Vila. Don't communicate with us at the palace except in an emergency. And don’t use names, even then. [starts to walk away]

SOOLIN 

Hang on a moment. If we have to meet you officially, what is your name?

AVON 

I’m...Major Dagstat, in the service of his royal highness, the crown prince Landros of Hiltarno—

SOOLIN 

Oh.

AVON 

—here on an unofficial visit.

TARRANT 

And that’s me. I think I’m going to enjoy this.

AVON 

Don’t let it go to your head. I’m your equerry, your aide, not your valet.

VILA 

Why him, I mean, why this sudden rush of modesty from you?

AVON 

He looks the part, spoiled young scion of an ancient line.

VILA 

Ah, know what you mean—effete, decadent, dim...

TARRANT 

Thank you. It’s good to know my true qualities have been recognised at last.

AVON 

According to Orac, the king of Hiltarno used to be little more than a space pirate, from a long line of them, just like our host, King Gheblakon. Tarrant is the right age to be the king of Hiltarno’s son. In any case, the servant is always in a far more privileged position than his master. Tarrant will be confined to the state apartments, I’ll be able to go anywhere. Get going, you two. I’ll contact you. If you go down that alleyway, you’ll be able to mingle with the tourists.