The Therapy Zone

     "Call the substitue, call the subsitute, the subsitute, the substitute, call the substitute."

   That's what happened during the human chess match during the episode of Checkmate, when the Rook-No.53 made an independent move on the chessboard. "The cult of the individual" as the white Queen-No.8 put it.

    However it was not only the Supervisor-No.56 who called for the Rook to be substituted, for another Rook it has to be said. Because the late world chess champion and Grand Master Bobby Fischer, also had the notion of substituting the Rook! Not for another Rook it has to be said, but by a new and different chesspiece all together, and one making a very different move to the Rook altogether. Bobby Fischer is pictured here, a Grand Master playing in New York in 1962.

 Arrival

    In the conversation between the new No.2 and the Prisoner he says "We do here what has to be done. It's the law of survival. It's either them or us." Imprison people, steal their minds, destroy them! "Depends on whose side you're on, doesn't it?" To which the Prisoner replies "I'm on our side." What the side of the village? If his own people put him here, there cannot be any question of which side runs the village. And if the village is set up to gather information, as suggested in Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling, it's not just the reason behind the Prisoner's resignation that they want - but all the information inside his head! The Prisoner has been put in the village for the protection of National security, and to be thoroughly debriefed at their leisure! And it might have worked, had they offered him something in return. Oh but of course they did, or at least No.2 did. It was during the aerial tour of the village when No.2 suggested to the Prisoner "You might even be given a position of authority." Well No.2’s words did actually come true, that offer that position of authority, in Fall Out, they offered No.6, or Sir as he became to be addressed as, the offer of ultimate power!

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