Blake's 7

Paul Darrow

Description

Many legends surround the aftermath of the collapse of The Federation, including the fate of Kerr Avon...What happened to Avon after the death of Blake and the crew of the Scorpio? Paul Darrow's vivid re-imagining picks up Avon's story at the final moments of the final episode of Blake's 7 and follows him on his fight for survival, this time with no crew and no ship to help him.The adventure continues years later as Avon, now an old man, finds himself a key player in the game of power politics being played out on a grand scale by The Quartet - four ruthless leaders in an uneasy alliance, who govern the world in place of the Federation. Old enemies resurface and dangerous new ones appear as the time comes for old scores to finally be settled...

Sujets

• Space opera

Informations

• Publié par: Big Finish Productions
• Date de parution: 03 mai 2013
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781781780473
• Langue: English

Extrait

BLAKE’S 7 LUCIFER
Paul Darrow
BIG FINISH
First published in May 2013 by Big Finish Productions Ltd, PO Box 1127, Maidenhead, SL6 3LW
www.bigfinish.com
Executive Producers for Big Finish: Nicholas Briggs and Jason Haigh-Ellery
Blake’s 7 Producer for Big Finish: David Richardson
Executive Editor for B7 Media: Andrew Mark Sewell
Managing Editor: Jason Haigh-Ellery
Production Editor: Xanna Eve Chown
With thanks to Peter Anghelides
Cover design: Anthony Lamb
Copyright © Paul Darrow 2013
The right of Paul Darrow to be identified as the author of this Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. The moral right of the authors has been asserted. All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to any persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information retrieval system, without prior permission, in writing, from the publisher. This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
Blake’s 7 ™ © B7 Enterprises Ltd 2013. All rights reserved.
Blake’s 7 wordmark and logo are trademarks of B7 Enterprises Ltd and are used under licence.
Based on the original television series Blake’s 7 created by Terry Nation.
Blake’s 7 television series pictures © BBC 2013 and used under licence.
ISBN 978-1-78178-046-6
ebook: 978-1-78178-047-3
For Janet
CONTENTS
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
*
PROLOGUE
PART ONE: NOW
PART TWO: THEN
PART THREE: NOW AND AGAIN
EPILOGUE
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
THE QUARTET
Head of the Terran Federation, successor to the High Council. Based on the Earth-like planet Iphigenia and its moon, Niobe; and on the Hub, a man-made planetoid orbiting Mars .
Doctor Pandora Ess, former aide to Servalan
Rafael de Horn, ex-military
General Gregor Steiner, ex-military
Professor Claude Witt, an economist
also
Eugene Furneaux, Witt’s lover and protegé
Kafka, Ess’s bodyguard
Servalan, former President of the Terran Federation
THE BASE
Warship assigned to the outer reaches of Terran space in the last years of the Federation: its scout ship, the Icarus; its recovery vessel, the Plough .
Gabriella, the Commandant
Alphonse Dreyfus, her deputy
March Dreyfus, his sister and head of Alpha crew
Shiloh, her second-in-command
Major Joel Cannon
Skarn, a veteran trooper
THE ISLAND PLANET OF Gaius 7
A splinter of Gaius 7, a planet in the Beyond. The island is now drifting through the planetary system of Aegisthus .
Kerr Avon, former freedom fighter/terrorist
Magda, his lover
Cassandra, her mother
EASTERN EARTH
Formerly the People’s Republic of China, now in effective control of Earth and its moon, Hebe .
Li Lim, leader of Eastern Earth forces
Yu Chang, his cousin and deputy
Sun Teng, second-in-command to Li Lim
also
Li Kang
Feng Sun, his second-in-command
Fu Ti
Commander Kwai
SPACECRAFT MIRANDA
Prime space, 20 years earlier
Serge Collon
Miranda, his daughter
Dancer, his son
Reuben
Hector, the pilot
Swan, on-board computer
OTHERS
Rufus Pearl, former owner of the Miranda , warlord of the Beyond, and an elite alien Grey
Rene Genoa, Federation attack cruiser captain
Kurt Genoa, Federation grandee, his father
Lucifer:
A match to light a fire…
A fallen angel…
Satan.
* * *
Let us to’t pell-mell
If not to heaven, then hand in hand to hell!
Richard III, Act V Sc iii
William Shakespeare
PROLOGUE
There was a time when the Federation ruled – or at least had control over – the known universe, as well as continually expanding into the unknown. Until, that is, it reached what was known as the Edge of the Beyond.
Whilst ambition is in many cases admirable, it was here that the aspirations of the Federation, tainted with hubris, proved too great. Ignoring the fact that its supply lines were overstretched, it launched an attack upon the disparate warlords who inhabited the Beyond.
Not so disparate, the warlords, forewarned, launched a series of hit-and-run counter attacks that soon had the Federation forces reeling. Unable to sustain their foolhardy adventure, they broke and ran out of the Beyond and through the Edge, with warlords and their voracious followers in hot pursuit.
Nemesis!
Not as ambitious as their defeated opponents, the warlords – there were seven, each commanding at least a thousand men and women, well equipped and possessed of fast, heavily armed, gunships – plundered Federation territory, and showed no mercy to any unfortunates who were wounded or otherwise unable to keep up with their retreating comrades. Then, wisely, they withdrew to where they had come from.
They did not know, nor did they care, that they had dealt a mortal blow. For, within an Earth year, the edifice that had once been a mighty empire crumbled and fell. They, the warlords, went back to their old ways. Feuding and fighting, raping and pillaging… until, that is, any other threat to their way of life should present itself.
And yet, one empire can soon be replaced by another and often is. Opportunists abound and are quick to take advantage of the disadvantages of others. So it would inevitably come to pass that the Federation would be replaced by what would appear to be, in the beginning, a benign dictatorship. But a dictatorship, nonetheless.
Of course, before that could happen, the people of the fallen empire needed to be appeased. Promises of health, wealth and happiness had to be made and those who made them needed to be plausible, likeable and masters – or mistresses – of duplicity, and there has never been a time when one or two such beings failed to make themselves available.
But the appeasement of the people, the mob crying out for blood, had to come first. Charismatic men and women with hitherto untapped ambition – that word again – and a sense of how their fellow beings could be manipulated by the strength of their will, came to the fore. They very quickly imposed themselves and formed committees and private armies.
Coming together, these committees and armies sought out their former leaders on Earth and, having captured those who had not had the foresight to flee their wrath, placed them on trial, convicted and executed them.
The executions were not a pretty sight. The male convicts were castrated and eviscerated before being bludgeoned to death by selected ‘deserving’ members of the public, whilst a baying crowd looked on. Females, if deemed attractive enough, were branded with hot irons and sold to the brothels that served the hoi polloi. The unattractive were publicly beheaded.
Four leaders emerged from apparent chaos. Present and future enemies would refer to them as the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Excepting that one was a woman and they rarely rode horses, the description would prove to be apt. They were clever. Of the three men, two of them were ex-military, the third a renowned economist. The woman was an unsavoury character called Doctor Ess. Although no-one knew in which field she held her doctorate, and she wasn’t letting on; suffice it to say she would prove to be the real power behind the future – leaner and meaner than the Federation – Empire.
Gregor Steiner and Rafael de Horn, the former army men, secured the fragile loyalty of what was left of the military by means of lavish gifts, promotions, payment in gold instead of devalued credits, and other incentives that were hard to resist. In addition, they created an elite force called the Iron Guards, these being carefully selected, physically fit men and women, ruthless in their allegiance to their founders. Also, a new police force was formed from those who had been observed to be at the forefront of the vengeful mob.
Meanwhile, Doctor Ess, in company with the economist Professor Claude Witt, created her own power base by exercising control over all financial matters and forming her own personal guard.
It took a while, but the Quartet, as they were officially described, restored order out of the chaos of what was a shrinking but volatile Earth population. They then turned their attention toward the heavens with a view to salvaging what was left of the ravaged former empire.
All too well aware that the fickle peoples of former-Federation Earth could turn upon them, they moved quickly. They needed a long-term plan that would allow them to settle on a new planet which could become the heart of their new Empire. From where they could exercise greater control of Earth. Always assuming they would not decide to abandon it.
Earth’s moon had been settled for a century. Massive domes housed life-sustaining machinery, as well as artificially cultivated agricultural land, greenhouses for tending edible crops, vineyards and luxurious accommodation. Water was obtained from deep drilled wells. Each dome resembled a huge glass cage protecting pleasant, open-planned townships and villages. Hebe, the moon, was an ideal relocation for the rich and infamous.
It was to here, then, that some who managed to escape the clutches of those who would humiliate and ultimately destroy them had fled. As few as two thousand Federation grandees boosted the population. Itself no more than half a million, they were easily accommodated. Provided they were wealthy and influential.
To their former close comrades (nearly forty thousand were executed) and those lesser mortals (seven million of whom lost their lives) they gave no thought. A world awash with blood was no longer their concern.
But the bloody Earth did, for the time being at least, concern the Quartet. Temporarily calmed, it w