(no subject)
El Oh El Ay
Blake’s 7
FR-T
Drama, Action
They knew Gan was strong, so they took no chances. They hit him with two stun blasts and then had a metrocop on each arm to hold him on his knees. I only rated a single cop with a hand on my collar. What can I say; they had my number.
It was late. Gan and I had just been heading for home when the patrol grabbed us and my first thought was that we’d left it a little too late and broken curfew. Then the officer in charge swaggrered out, however, and I knew it must be much worse. He wore a captain’s bars, which meant it must be important, and he wasn’t wearing his ABC helmet, which meant it must be personal.
“Vila Restal?” the captain said.
“Never heard of him,” I assured him.
“Oleg Gan?”
“What?” Gan replied. It’s no good; I’ll never teach him to be a decent thief, not if we live to be a hundred years old, which frankly looked unlikely at this juncture. He’s got all the guile of a puppy.
“You are both bound by law…” he began.
Wonderful, I thought. This is what comes of working with amateurs. I knew we shouldn’t have brought those Andromedan twins in on our last job.
“…on a charge of sedition, incitement and conspiracy against the body politic,” he finished. “Anything you say will be entered into the record of evidence; failure to mention during questioning anything which forms part of your defence may be prejudicial to your case.” With the formalities over, he grinned nastily. “Not that it matters,” he went on. “We’ve got the weapons and the log tapes. We know what you’ve been up to.”
“That seems to be more than we know,” I told him. “We haven’t a clue what you’re talking about.”
It was true. We were thieves, in a very successful partnership, but we’d never mucked about with guns and we’d certainly never considered anything as reckless as rebellion. Gan had his family to think about, and I cared far too much about my own survival.
“We’re not gun runners and we’re not rebels,” Gan agreed. “You’ve got the wrong men.”
“The trial will make that decision,” the captain assured us. “You’ll be taken to Unit 101-Central for questioning.”
“What?” I could feel my face growing pale. “But that’s Fed HQ, not Metropol!”
“Treason is a federal matter,” he assured us. “Take them away and…”
“No!” The door of our hab burst open and a figure in white appeared. This was Lola, Gan’s wife, and a prettier - or curvier - alpha never lowered herself to marry an epsilon. Her father had approved the marriage after Gan saved his life in the riots of 2230 and since then had given us a lot of work helping dispossessed alphas regain some of their state acquired goods.
Lola rushed out of the building and stood in front of the captain. She had a lot of good qualities, Lola Gan, but while loyalty was high on the list, self-preservation was not. “You can not arrest my husband!” she insisted, as though that was going to work.
“Hey!” I protested.
“Or him,” she added more reluctantly, and only because I was too publically Gan’s business associate for there to be any chance of rescuing just one of us.
“I am Lola Mai,” she insisted. “My father…”
“Is as penniless as the rest of Croydon’s former élite,” the captain scoffed. “Otherwise he’d hardly have let a pretty thing like you marry a common street thug like Oleg Gan.”
“How dare you…!” Lola in high dudgeon had always scared the hell out of me, but the captain barely seemed to notice her fury.
“Say goodbye,” he suggested. “You won’t see your husband again.” He leaned close to her. I don’t think Gan heard what he said next, but I could make it out. “Strictly between us,” he purred, “if no-one else steps up to take the blame, they’ll both be dead by the time they reach the holding cells. Still; if you feel lonely…”
Lola pushed him angrily away. He began to laugh, but she pulled a knife from inside her nightdress and raked it across his cheek. He took half a step back, drew his sidearm and shot her in the stomach. Lola sank to her knees, looking surprised. Like I said, she never had much sense of self-preservation. She should at least have seen that one coming. Still, even I didn’t expect what happened next.
The captain stepped forward, put his pistol to Lola’s head and shot her dead. I’ve been a thief all my life and cops don’t do that. Cops don’t do anything like that. He hadn’t been joking about 101-Central, but why was a Fed dressing up like a metrocop to muscle trash like us?
Before I could give the matter any more thought, Gan went berserk.
I said they knew he was strong, and that they took no chances. Turned out that they had no idea how strong Gan was - how could they, I doubt if he’d ever really explored his limits before then - and that when it came to chances, they never stood one.
First one, then the other, the two cops on his arms went flying through the air like rag dolls. I could hear the bones snapping as they landed.
The captain turned his pistol on Gan and fired once, but then Gan had his wrist and the bones cracked. The man who was holding my collar let go of me to deal with Gan and I hit him over the head. It wasn’t an act of heroism or anything, it was pure desperation; I’d realised by now that we were marked for death. The usual routine of coming quietly and ‘look, where did that money come from?’ just wasn’t going to cut it.
Still holding his wrist, Gan put a hand on the captain’s chest and pushed. He shoved the captain back against the wall and then… kept pushing.
I couldn’t watch, but there wasn’t much I could do about the noises.
After that I had to drag Gan away. He didn’t want to go, kept muttering ‘my fault; it’s my fault’. I hadn’t the heart to tell him what I’d worked out while he was crushing the life out of a Fed.
Those crates we’d been moving for the past few weeks weren’t full of confiscated antiques. If Gan hadn’t been keeping such an eagle eye on me to make sure I didn’t try to increase my cut, I might have realised that we were stealing guns from the government to supply rebels like Gan’s father-in-law.
Or like his wife.
The Feds weren’t there for us; we were a way of getting to Lola. I doubt they were supposed to kill her, but the posthumous bollocking that captain was about to receive would be precious little consolation to her, or to Gan, let alone to her father.
Gan will never work it out; he’s too honest. Even if the Feds catch us and tell him, he’ll never believe that his little Lola was a rebel, let alone that she was using him.
I believe it though.
No sense of self-preservation.
Blake's 7 was created by Terry Nation and reimagined by Ben Aaronovich. Spinning off from the audio play 'When Vila met Gan', this borrows from both.
Blake’s 7
FR-T
Drama, Action
They knew Gan was strong, so they took no chances. They hit him with two stun blasts and then had a metrocop on each arm to hold him on his knees. I only rated a single cop with a hand on my collar. What can I say; they had my number.
It was late. Gan and I had just been heading for home when the patrol grabbed us and my first thought was that we’d left it a little too late and broken curfew. Then the officer in charge swaggrered out, however, and I knew it must be much worse. He wore a captain’s bars, which meant it must be important, and he wasn’t wearing his ABC helmet, which meant it must be personal.
“Vila Restal?” the captain said.
“Never heard of him,” I assured him.
“Oleg Gan?”
“What?” Gan replied. It’s no good; I’ll never teach him to be a decent thief, not if we live to be a hundred years old, which frankly looked unlikely at this juncture. He’s got all the guile of a puppy.
“You are both bound by law…” he began.
Wonderful, I thought. This is what comes of working with amateurs. I knew we shouldn’t have brought those Andromedan twins in on our last job.
“…on a charge of sedition, incitement and conspiracy against the body politic,” he finished. “Anything you say will be entered into the record of evidence; failure to mention during questioning anything which forms part of your defence may be prejudicial to your case.” With the formalities over, he grinned nastily. “Not that it matters,” he went on. “We’ve got the weapons and the log tapes. We know what you’ve been up to.”
“That seems to be more than we know,” I told him. “We haven’t a clue what you’re talking about.”
It was true. We were thieves, in a very successful partnership, but we’d never mucked about with guns and we’d certainly never considered anything as reckless as rebellion. Gan had his family to think about, and I cared far too much about my own survival.
“We’re not gun runners and we’re not rebels,” Gan agreed. “You’ve got the wrong men.”
“The trial will make that decision,” the captain assured us. “You’ll be taken to Unit 101-Central for questioning.”
“What?” I could feel my face growing pale. “But that’s Fed HQ, not Metropol!”
“Treason is a federal matter,” he assured us. “Take them away and…”
“No!” The door of our hab burst open and a figure in white appeared. This was Lola, Gan’s wife, and a prettier - or curvier - alpha never lowered herself to marry an epsilon. Her father had approved the marriage after Gan saved his life in the riots of 2230 and since then had given us a lot of work helping dispossessed alphas regain some of their state acquired goods.
Lola rushed out of the building and stood in front of the captain. She had a lot of good qualities, Lola Gan, but while loyalty was high on the list, self-preservation was not. “You can not arrest my husband!” she insisted, as though that was going to work.
“Hey!” I protested.
“Or him,” she added more reluctantly, and only because I was too publically Gan’s business associate for there to be any chance of rescuing just one of us.
“I am Lola Mai,” she insisted. “My father…”
“Is as penniless as the rest of Croydon’s former élite,” the captain scoffed. “Otherwise he’d hardly have let a pretty thing like you marry a common street thug like Oleg Gan.”
“How dare you…!” Lola in high dudgeon had always scared the hell out of me, but the captain barely seemed to notice her fury.
“Say goodbye,” he suggested. “You won’t see your husband again.” He leaned close to her. I don’t think Gan heard what he said next, but I could make it out. “Strictly between us,” he purred, “if no-one else steps up to take the blame, they’ll both be dead by the time they reach the holding cells. Still; if you feel lonely…”
Lola pushed him angrily away. He began to laugh, but she pulled a knife from inside her nightdress and raked it across his cheek. He took half a step back, drew his sidearm and shot her in the stomach. Lola sank to her knees, looking surprised. Like I said, she never had much sense of self-preservation. She should at least have seen that one coming. Still, even I didn’t expect what happened next.
The captain stepped forward, put his pistol to Lola’s head and shot her dead. I’ve been a thief all my life and cops don’t do that. Cops don’t do anything like that. He hadn’t been joking about 101-Central, but why was a Fed dressing up like a metrocop to muscle trash like us?
Before I could give the matter any more thought, Gan went berserk.
I said they knew he was strong, and that they took no chances. Turned out that they had no idea how strong Gan was - how could they, I doubt if he’d ever really explored his limits before then - and that when it came to chances, they never stood one.
First one, then the other, the two cops on his arms went flying through the air like rag dolls. I could hear the bones snapping as they landed.
The captain turned his pistol on Gan and fired once, but then Gan had his wrist and the bones cracked. The man who was holding my collar let go of me to deal with Gan and I hit him over the head. It wasn’t an act of heroism or anything, it was pure desperation; I’d realised by now that we were marked for death. The usual routine of coming quietly and ‘look, where did that money come from?’ just wasn’t going to cut it.
Still holding his wrist, Gan put a hand on the captain’s chest and pushed. He shoved the captain back against the wall and then… kept pushing.
I couldn’t watch, but there wasn’t much I could do about the noises.
After that I had to drag Gan away. He didn’t want to go, kept muttering ‘my fault; it’s my fault’. I hadn’t the heart to tell him what I’d worked out while he was crushing the life out of a Fed.
Those crates we’d been moving for the past few weeks weren’t full of confiscated antiques. If Gan hadn’t been keeping such an eagle eye on me to make sure I didn’t try to increase my cut, I might have realised that we were stealing guns from the government to supply rebels like Gan’s father-in-law.
Or like his wife.
The Feds weren’t there for us; we were a way of getting to Lola. I doubt they were supposed to kill her, but the posthumous bollocking that captain was about to receive would be precious little consolation to her, or to Gan, let alone to her father.
Gan will never work it out; he’s too honest. Even if the Feds catch us and tell him, he’ll never believe that his little Lola was a rebel, let alone that she was using him.
I believe it though.
No sense of self-preservation.
Blake's 7 was created by Terry Nation and reimagined by Ben Aaronovich. Spinning off from the audio play 'When Vila met Gan', this borrows from both.