But the best laid plans of mice and men- or other humanoids- often go astray. The next morning they were woken early by the ship repairers to be told that the job would take at least another day. Zoe was furious.
"A simple job like that- it's taking far too long. And the quality certainly doesn't make up for it."
"That's what you get if you use cowboy builders," Patrick muttered. Ruth sighed.
"Even kidnapping and space travel haven't quenched your appetite for bad puns, have they?" she said. He giggled.
"Look, there's Jimdrick," Rob, one of the other men from the cast, said.
"He looks upset," Agnes said. "Let's go and see what's up."
They left the ship and went over to him, leaving Will to try and calm Zoe down. She's angry because she's afraid of what might happen to her father, Ruth thought. Well, I feel sorry for them both, but if they hadn't come to kidnap us in the first place...
"I'm so glad you're still here," Jimdrick said as they came up to him. "Please- can't you help me? It's the curse- they are coming for me!"
He was in a terrible state of nerves, shaking all over and looking round anxiously. For a former pirate it was pitiful and surprising. "You've faced death and fighting many times," Rob said. "What is it about this curse that's so much worse than that?"
"They appeared to me- the ghosts! My father- his father- and all my ancestors. In the night, when I was alone, suddenly something cold touched me and I woke up, and they were there! They looked like holograms, but there was something more to them- something worse! They said I hadn't done my crime that day- that now I knew about the curse I was subject to their attentions. I said I wouldn't obey them, that I was not going to commit crimes to please them, but they tortured me- oh, such pain! I couldn't bear it. I begged them to stop- to give me time to decide. They gave me twenty three hours to decide."
"Twenty three?" Tom said. "Oh, of course, that's the length of the days here..."
"Please, you've got to help me," Jimdrick begged. "Everyone else is too scared of the curse, but you aren't. Please, can you help?"
The travellers looked at each other. "Well," Tom said eventually. "I don't know how, but we'll do our best."
"What are the exact terms of the curse?" Ernest asked.
"Just that I must do a crime every day," Jimdrick said.
"They don't say what sort of crime?" Agnes asked.
"No, just a crime- any crime." Everyone was quiet. Suddenly Patrick was struck by an idea.
"Ah! That could be it," he said excitedly. "Yes. I think I may have the solution."
It was late that evening, and some of the G&Sers were sitting around at Anne and Jimdrick's new home, waiting for the ghosts to turn up. Jimdrick was nervous, and so, they were surprised to see, was Anne.
"Suppose it doesn't work?" she said.
"Then I will have the choice, to commit a crime a day, or to die," he replied. "And...I don't know what I'll choose. I'd rather die that live a life as the slave of this curse- but I don't know if I have the courage to go through that torment." Anne took his hand and held it tightly.
"And what about me?" she said.
"I'm sorry," he replied.
Suddenly the air seemed to change, to thicken. A strange low humming noise filled the room. Jimdrick went white.
"It's them," he cried. "They have come for me!" He fell to his knees, covering his face with his hands. "Mercy! Mercy, my ancestors! Remember the day when you could bear this hideous life no longer, and pity me now!"
In the air around Jimdrick appeared seven shapes, some male, some female. To begin with they were flickery, transparent and monochrome, but their solidity and steadiness grew and colour ran like as wave across a beach, filling their bodies as the tide fills a rock pool.
"Cease this snivelling," commanded one of the holograms, that of a burly man in middle age. "I thought you were supposed to be a pirate, a man of courage, not some mouse-like wretch!"
"I was a pirate, but only against my will," Jimdrick managed to speak. "I am a pirate no longer, and I will not be a criminal. I refuse! I would sooner die!"
"Ah, but can you stand the pain, you pathetic creature?" the spectre asked, and reached out his hand towards the cowering Jimdrick. Jimdrick gasped, and writhed in agony. The other ghosts laughed, terrible cackles, totally without pity.
"Just a moment," said Ernest, stepping forward. The holograms turned their attention to him, leaving Jimdrick, for the moment, to Bonny Anne who bent down to comfort him.
"To fulfil the criteria of this curse he has to commit a crime, yes?" Ernest asked the holograms.
"Yes, that is what the curse says," the leading spectre answered.
"But what is a crime?" asked Patrick the philosopher. "I mean, how do you define crime?"
The ghosts looked at each other. "Well, it's obvious, isn't it," said one, shuffling its opaque feet. "It's something that's wrong, isn't it?"
"Ahh, but what do you mean by wrong?" Rob said.
"Well, I...I don't know," the lead hologram replied, somewhat confused. He looked at the others. "Any ideas, chaps?"
"Well, it's something that isn't right," one of the others said.
"Something bad," said another.
"But what do you mean by bad? What moral code are you using to define right and wrong?" Patrick asked.
"What?"
"I mean, how do you know what's right and what's wrong? How do you know what is a crime?"
"Well, it's obvious, it's something that's against the law...isn't it?"
"Well, no, not really," Ernest said. "This planet is pretty lawless. Whose law do you judge him against? Different places have different ideas of right and wrong. So a crime elsewhere may not be a crime here, and a crime here may be something you don't recognise as wrong. So how will you tell?"
"What we're saying," Patrick said, "is that it's impossible for you to define good and bad. You'd agree with that?"
"Well, I suppose so, after what you've said," the leader replied, looking round at the others.
"It seems reasonable," another said.
"At first sight it does," said a third.
"Fallacy somewhere, I fancy," said the hologram of a woman, who looked rather more intelligent than the others.
"Oh, you're never satisfied," the leader said to her.
"Well then," Rob continued, "If you can't do that, you can't decide what a crime is, can you?"
"Well, no," the leader said.
"Fallacy somewhere," the female hologram muttered.
"Then how can you decide whether he's committed a crime or not?" Ernest asked triumphantly. The holograms looked at one another, stumped.
"It's a paradox," said Patrick. "You cannot say he has committed a crime since it is impossible for you to define a crime. Therefore, by the very terms of the curse- that's you- Jimdrick must commit a crime a day, and yet cannot commit a crime a day. A most ingenious paradox."
"A paradox," the leader said. "I...I do not understand. He must fulfil the curse- he cannot fulfil the curse- it is impossible! We are defeated- the curse is broken!" There was a bang and a flash of many-coloured light that made the travellers close their eyes. When they opened them again, the holograms had disappeared. A last wail of "fallacy somewhere!" drifted back to their ears, then there was nothing more.
The next morning the travellers again stood in the sheriff's office. This time the wedding had no interruptions, no unwanted visitors or startling revelations. Queen Argent and her pirates, the sheriff said, were safely in prison in the planet's capital, awaiting trial. It seemed that they would be there for some time.
And the Hilarity was ready to take off. As soon as the ceremony was over the travellers said goodbye to Bonny Anne and Jimdrick, knowing that it was unlikely that they would meet again.
"Thank you so much," Jimdrick said. "If it wasn't for you none of this would have happened."
"And if it wasn't for you we'd still be prisoners- or slaves, or dead," Emma said. "Thank you."
And if it wasn't for Will and Zoe we'd never have been captured in the first place, Ruth thought, as they made their way back to the spaceport and went aboard their ship. She wondered how many more adventures they would have before they got home- if they ever did.
"Do you actually believe all that, about not being able to define good and bad?" she asked Patrick as they stood watching Zoe and Will make preparations for lift off. "Rather amoral, don't you think? It could be used to excuse anything."
"I'm not sure," he said. "Only partly. Like the hologram said, it feels like there's a fallacy somewhere. But it worked on the curse."
"Just as well," she said, as the ship lifted into the sky and the planet and the pirates were left behind them.
The story continues in Episode 5.
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