A summary of Sergei Lukyanenko’s "The Dock of Yellow Ships" Automatic translate

This book is a collection of early works, created between 1986 and 1991. The texts represent the young writer’s very first literary steps. At the time, the author was strongly influenced by the work of Vladislav Krapivin. Complex socio-philosophical conflicts, the clashes between dictatorial regimes and freedom-loving loners, are revealed through the prism of youthful maximalism. The reader witnesses the characters’ coming of age in harsh circumstances. Many stories remained in manuscript form for a long time. Some texts were published only in regional magazines before finding life under a single cover.

The Thirteenth City

Dima, a space school cadet, crashes on an unknown planet. His training ship explodes. Dima is forced to wait for months for rescue in a tiny metal boat. He begins exploring the area and discovers a post-apocalyptic civilization. Society is rigidly divided into two warring camps. The inhabitants of enormous tower-cities endure total control. The rulers suppress all emotion, love, and individuality with chemicals and harsh discipline. Duty officers monitor their subordinates’ every move. The other group of people are the "outsiders." They survive in the wild, radioactive desert.

The plot revolves around a young City resident named Tiri. His affection for a girl named Gal angers the sector’s Duty Officer. Outsiders sneak through the ventilation shafts and kidnap Tiri from her bedroom. In the hot desert, Tiri meets Dima and the experienced fighter Archie. Dima, a human, incinerates the Duty Officers’ three-meter-tall, six-legged combat robot with a plasma blaster. Using the lifeboat’s linguistic computer, the young people find common ground. The group arms itself and decides to infiltrate the City. They want to tell all the oppressed residents the truth about the free world beyond the steel walls. After cutting through an armored bulkhead with a laser, the rebels infiltrate the warehouse. They paralyze the Duty Officers and attempt to broadcast a videotape calling for rebellion. The broadcast fails because the receiving screens are disabled. A fierce firefight ensues at the train station. Archie’s faithful friend, the conductor Garth, is killed there. Dima manages to inject the dying man with a strong painkiller.

The heroes steal a high-speed maglev and infiltrate the hidden Thirteenth City. There they meet the ruling elite. The Decision Maker reveals a shocking truth to Dima. Rumors of an equality serum are false. The brutal dictatorship is maintained by strict upbringing and fear. The Thirteenth City serves as a comfortable, secret oasis for the planet’s intellectual elite. Tiri finds the lost Gal. The young man is horrified to realize the falsity of her previous feelings. The girl sincerely loves the new Sector Duty Officer, Ros, and refuses to run. Dima escapes on a rescue ship. Tiri and Archie remain on the planet to continue their hopeless struggle.

"Yellow Ships’ Dock"

Spaceman Kirill abandons his malfunctioning yacht. He parachutes onto an uncharted planet. He finds himself in a strange, eclectic world. Medieval crossbows and swords exist side by side with high-tech devices. Kirill is rescued from the gondola of a flying hot air balloon by two local brothers, Dean and Tony. Kirill soon discovers a terrible truth. Spontaneous space-time ruptures are constantly occurring on the planet. The steel-clad Unity Patrol vigilantly maintains public order. These warrior monks mercilessly destroy any technological anachronisms.

The brothers hide from armed patrolmen, hungry savages, and terrifying mutants. They discover an ancient cache of bioforms in the forest. Merging with the malleable protoplasm, Dean and Tony temporarily transform into giant swamp wolves. The beasts tear through an aggressively attacking pack of scaly predators. In the battle, Kirill loses his protective suit forever. The trio walk dozens of kilometers to the seaside Capital, known as the Rose of the Winds. Kirill accidentally meets the arrogant Count of Lakeland. The aristocrat saves the racer from patrolling soldiers in a port tavern. It later turns out that the Count is Dean’s sworn enemy. A bloody street riot erupts in the Capital. Hundreds of innocent people, including the Count himself, perish on the cobblestone streets.

Kirill learns the planet’s secret history from the Senior Consultant. It turns out that the Unity Patrol is made up of aging Earth colonists. They arrived here long ago on the cruiser Eurydice. Physicist Ren created a unique time inverter. The crew intentionally traveled back in time to build an ideal utopian society. However, the colony quickly began to deteriorate. To accelerate stalled progress, the leaders began importing technology from the distant future. Because of this, paradoxical rifts in time have become the universe’s natural defense mechanism. Kirill melts down his unique entropy pistol. He refuses evacuation to Earth to prevent the Eurydice from launching in his time. The Patrol Consultant shoots the young man in cold blood. Before he dies, the racer sees the legendary Yellow Ships over the sea. They serve as a mystical symbol of a life well lived.

The Eighth Color of the Rainbow

The events take place in a world where magic and technology are intertwined. A powerful Fortress wages a grueling war against hordes of nomads. Mages of the seven colors of the rainbow command the defense of its stone walls. The settlement survives solely thanks to constant trade with the Flying People, earthlings who arrive on enormous cargo turbochargers. Young cadet Rodak belongs to the green band of healers. He accidentally saves the Flying People’s navigator, Denis, from death. Rodak hides the alien in an abandoned house using a Reflection spell. The treachery of the Fortress’s rulers soon becomes apparent. Rodak’s father, the head of the Guard, Dektor, instigated a bloody massacre at the ship berth. Soldiers destroyed the sleeping earth crews in order to seize valuable aircraft. Rodak refuses to obey his cruel father. He secretly escorts Denis and the miraculously surviving pilot, Jose, to the captured turbochargers. The heroes make their way through armed crowds of sleeping nomads at night. The humans safely land Rodak on the Fortress’s high battle wall. Pilot Jose takes control. He directs the falling, flaming machine straight into the parking lot of the stolen equipment. This act of true self-sacrifice symbolizes the invisible eighth color of the rainbow.

Short stories

The book includes short parables and caustic satirical sketches. In "The Legend of the First Atheist," a starving chieftain of a feral tribe kills a shaman. The chieftain sabotages an ancient dynamo generator and a spaceship’s emergency transmitter, thereby forever depriving his people of any chance of salvation. The text "Violation" describes a dictatorial City through the eyes of a merciless cyborg. A Mechanical Dog indifferently pursues 18-year-old fugitives and kills them with a powerful discharge. The story "Someone Else’s Pain" exposes the cruelty of immortal people in the future. Recreating bloody historical slaughterhouses has become a common virtual pastime for them. The protagonist, Dan, refuses to block out physical suffering. He incinerates resuscitation robots with a ray gun and dies for real.

The satirical short story "Professional" depicts a grim ecological collapse. Richard, the creator of thought films, sells illusions of a pristine nature to city dwellers ravaged by acrid smog. He himself hunts mutated rats with a heavy crossbow to feed his mother and brother. "Time Spiral" tells the story of an elderly inventor, Semyon Ivanovich. The hero uses his portable time machine for petty mischief, sprinkling nails into the soup of his neighbors in an old communal apartment. In the palindrome "Catch a Five-Dimensional!", absolutely all the words begin with the letter "P." The text describes the absurd misadventures of alien fauna hunters Paul and Peter.

The story "The Last Hero" tones down the atmosphere of space exploits. The renowned pilot Hei solemnly sets off on a deadly mission to the distant star En-547. In reality, he’s simply flying to a secret rendezvous with his lover on Earth’s neighboring continent. The sketch "Officer for Special Assignments" conveys the atmosphere of total war. A tired military courier makes a brief stop at a dusty roadside bar. In the story "Pastor Andrei," a ship’s priest is forced to regularly imitate the rituals of dozens of different sects. Secretly, he remains a staunch atheist and reads banned books. The play "A Bicycle Is Being Made" ironically parodies the stylistic cliches of classic science fiction. The authors attempt to describe the invention of interstellar transport. The book concludes with the topical farce "Three Skinny People." This is the story of a provincial theater troupe led by actress Lida Bulkina. The actors attempt to adapt a children’s fairy tale to the rapidly changing political realities of the August coup. They use an inflatable American doll in place of the girl, Suok. In the final scene, the actors escape from angry village spectators through a bottomless cooking pot.