WITH A LITTLE HELP...
1 698 words
I have no claim on either Blake's 7 or any of the original characters.
"Damn!" Servalan said. She brought down her elegant fist upon her desk and swore again. "I wish that just once I could get the better of that man! Just once!"
"Well, my dear, that really shouldn't be too difficult. With my help, of course."
"What?" Servalan's head jerked up and she swung to the vision that had suddenly appeared in the corner of her office. "Who are you? How did you get in here? This is a very restricted area."
"So I believe." Her visitor moved forwards, shaking her head gently. Servalan stared, unable to believe her eyes.
She saw a little woman, not a metre tall, dressed in a very old fashioned full skirted striped dress, and with a delicate lacy shawl over her shoulders. An aura of lavender perfume accompanied her. A fluffy aureole of white hair and tiny slippers completed the image.
Servalan shook her head.
"I don't believe it. Who the hell are you? And how did you get in here, let alone onto Space Command in the first place?"
"Please, don't be profane, my child."
Child! Servalan stood up regally. Profane!!
"Just what - "
"I am your fairy godmother."
She sat down with a thud.
"My - what?"
"Your fairy godmother. Don't you know what a fairy godmother is? Don't you modern people read fairy stories any more?"
Servalan shuddered.
"Of course not. They were abolished long ago with all the rest of the religious and subversive institutions and such mumbo jumbo. You are not real."
"But of course I am real. How else could I be here if I were not real?" The little woman stood and regarded Servalan benignly. "Superstitious belief or lack of belief does not alter reality, you know."
Servalan leaned back and surveyed her through narrowed eyes.
"So what do you want?"
"Want? Me?" The woman laughed, a tinkling, melodious sound. "I want nothing. I am here purely and simply to serve you."
Servalan laughed derisively. This had gone far enough. But still she did not move to summon her guards.
"I am the President of the Terran Federation. There is nothing I cannot achieve."
"Nothing?" There was a sly smile on the other's face. "There is however, someone whom you would wish to defeat - even perhaps to destroy?"
Their eyes met and held. Servalan felt herself incapable of movement, but her thoughts rushed frantically. Defeat? Yes! But - destroy? She wondered. Her voice, when she finally spoke, was low and incredulous.
"You - can give me - anything? Anything at all?"
The fairy godmother nodded, a nod full of promise. Her sly smile widened as she leaned forwards slightly.
"Anything. Anything at all, Madame President. Or anyone."
Servalan stared, arrogant disbelief turning, and turning rapidly, to hope.
"You - really mean that?"
"Anything you wish, my child." The other's voice was soft. Servalan laughed. Quietly at first, and then until the tears came. The little woman stood and regarded her patiently until she had ceased.
"You were, I understand, wishing to get the better of someone? A man. Your lover, perhaps?"
"Definitely not!" Servalan responded tartly. "My enemy. The enemy of the Terran Federation."
"Oh." The other smiled in contempt. "Surely you do not need my help in order to better your enemies, Madam President?"
"I don't know." Servalan was rueful, and candid. "To defeat this one - and his associates, I think I need a lot of help. It is not easy." She suddenly realised she had admitted her helplessness. "You will not repeat my words to anyone," she said sharply, and the other woman looked bland and disinterested.
"I shall repeat nothing, my child. Your welfare and happiness are my prime concerns. You must tell me what you wish me to do, so that I may make full and proper use of all my powers."
"Powers?" Servalan regarded her suspiciously. "What powers?"
"Why, magic of course, my dear! Fairy godmothers use magic."
"Magic," Servalan repeated, wondering if perhaps she were merely imagining all this.
"Of course." After all, she had been under considerable stress recently. She surreptitiously pinched her forearm. And winced. Her fairy godmother continued to regard her calmly.
"I am real, my dear. No amount of pinching can make me disappear. Unless, of course, you yourself order me to leave."
"Of course," Servalan echoed again weakly. The little woman raised the thin silver stick she held in her left hand, and Servalan blinked at the shining silver star affixed to the end of it, then her mouth dropped open as suddenly, and from nowhere, appeared a little stool, upon which her visitor seated herself, spreading her skirts and brushing away imaginary specks of dust.
"Now, my dear, you can tell me all about it." She waved the wand again and a silver tray appeared, complete with a tea service of fine porcelain. "Would you care for a cup of tea while we talk? And some small cakes?" She gave a wicked smile, the significance of which totally eluded the President. "Perhaps a lamington?"
"Attention." Zen's voice was as emotionless as ever. "There is an unexplained primary malfunction in the drive system. All power units are registering a rapid power drain. Speed is rapidly diminishing. Estimated time to zero velocity is twelve minutes."
"What?"
Avon's eyebrows rose and Tarrant's handsome face displayed disbelief.
"Zen, report on weaponry systems!" Their first thought was to defend themselves.
"There is total malfunction in weaponry. No power is available for either defence or offence."
"Zen, report reason for malfunction!"
"That information is not available. The malfunctions continue. Liberator is under external control." Zen paused. "However, no external control can result in such drastic malfunctions. This is a total anomaly."
"Orac!" Avon had run to the small semi transparent box and slammed in its key. "Are you up to your tricks again?"
For once, Orac's tone was subdued rather than irascible.
"The situation is as incomprehensible to me as it is to Zen. I shall investigate further, but my suspicion is that these problems are the result of some hitherto unencountered force, the immensity of which may be immeasurable."
Avon pulled a face and turned to Tarrant and behind him the others, who had come to the flight deck in response to a call Tarrant had decided it might be prudent to put out.
"What's going on?" demanded Dayna.
"Attention. Sensor report. Liberator and all its contents, organic and inorganic, are currently undergoing a rapid molecular implosion. Estimated time to zero mass at current rate is - "
"Don't tell us," begged Vila, his eyes widening in disbelief. He remembered how Orac had obligingly shrunk itself for Avon and himself, so long ago. That was all right, but the idea that he himself - Vila Restal - was undergoing a similar process was alarming, to say the very least. Avon had listened to Zen with narrowed eyes.
"That is not possible," he said slowly. "Zen, you must be malfunctioning. Check all systems."
"All systems have been thorough checked. The Liberator and all it contains continue the molecular implosion."
"That's enough. Stop the reduction, Zen."
"That is not possible."
"Why?"
"There is no cause for molecular implosion to be taking place."
"No cause?" Tarrant blinked. "Do you mean to say, Zen, that it is just - happening? For no reason at all! And you don't know why?"
"Affirmative. There is no reason for current events being as they are. Logic units can find no satisfactory explanations for reality being as it is. Without reasons and causes, no counter measures can be determined and put into place."
Cally looked at Avon, concern in her eyes.
"So, there really is nothing Zen can do."
Avon pulled a face.
"That would appear to be correct."
"Attention. Sensors report an irresistible tractor beam from a non existent source."
"Ohmigawd!" muttered Vila. "I knew it. I knew one day Zen'd finally flip. Oh hell!" He dropped into his seat and buried his face in his hands.
"A non existent source?" echoed Tarrant. "That is impossible."
Dayna grinned crookedly, more from nervous reaction than any kind of amusement.
"So how many impossibilities does that make so far today?"
"Attention. There is an incoming message, from President Servalan, at Space Command Headquarters."
Avon let out his breath.
"I should have known she would have something to do with this."
"Avon?" Cally's voice was low. "What is happening to us? Do you think Servalan has the capacity to do this to us?"
He stood very still, and then turned to her slowly.
"I don't know," he said quietly. "I really don't know." He rubbed at his chin. "I would not have thought so, but something definitely is going on, and I am damned sure it is not mere coincidence she is calling at this precise moment."
Tarrant walked across to join them.
"I suppose we'd better find out what she wants." He grinned cheerfully and inanely. "It'd be nice and reassuring to discover the same thing was happening to her too. Maybe the whole universe is imploding." He looked around at them. "Sort of an opposite effect to the Big Bang."
Avon forbore to respond to this latest idiocy, except to think that such speculations were more worthy of Vila rather than Tarrant. He sighed.
"Put her on the screen, Zen."
Servalan smiled serenely down at them. She was not alone.
Some time later, Madam President Servalan had cause to interview a young Space Commander in her study. After he had received his orders, which, to his surprise contained nothing at all about attempting to discover the present location of the infamous Rebel ship, he remarked on the crystalline block on her desk. Smiling, she held it up to the light for his closer inspection.
"My new paperweight," she smirked and the Space Commander regarded it, frowning thoughtfully.
"Exquisite craftsmanship, Madam President. An exact replica of the Liberator in miniature."
She took it back and gazed into its crystal depths, smiling a smug and secretive little smile.
"Oh no, Space Commander. Not quite an exact replica."
Servalan wins - heh, heh!!