The Last Day (audio story)
The Last Day was an audio story comprising the fourteenth and fifteenth releases of The Seventh Doctor Adventures, produced by Big Finish Productions. It was written by Matt Fitton and Guy Adams and starred Sylvester McCoy as the Seventh Doctor.
Part One, containing the first six parts of the story, was released on 28 December 2023.
Publisher's summary
Part one
There is always injustice to fight. There is always a new danger for the universe. But what if the Doctor found a way to put things right, once and for all? Would it really be so terrible to take a stand? Would the end justify the means? And would his friends agree? The Seventh Doctor’s last day is coming...
Plot
Part one
On Ungar, Mel runs from the voice of a carnivorous hotel and is rescued by Ace in the TARDIS, neither of which she entirely recognises. The ship struggles to fly through the broken universe, which was caused by somebody taking complete control of it and which Ace believes could be responsible for Mel's memory problems. Mel remembers the Doctor and Ace explains that she is gathering people to save the universe since the Doctor is lost. She agrees to help and Ace leaves her in a desert where she soon meets Benny.
Hex wakes up from a dream about a giant frog and takes his and Sally's youngest children, Damo and Evie, to school on the way to the hospital where he works as a healthcare manager. He gets stuck at work and sees on the news that the World Administration are cutting rations and instituting new security measures which the President will later be giving a speech on. Whilst he is on the phone with Sally, Ace, whom he recognises from his dreams, uses psychic paper to pretend to be an inspector and gets him to help move her cases into the hospital.
Ace tells Hex that she used to travel with him and Sally, something he has no memory of, and gives him with a beeping device after the presidential address begins, telling him that it will change the way he sees things. Watching the speech, he recognises that Ace is almost identical to President McShane. Elsewhere, the Master is rescued from being buried alive by Ace, who stuns his superstitious attackers and demands his help in saving the universe.
Part two
Ace infiltrates Kane's relaxation room on Proamon and threatens him with a flamethrower, forcing him to watch how she captured Garundel to join in her mission to save the universe. Kane does not believe that she is capable of killing somebody in cold blood and is proven right when she refuses his order to kill his guards, but she claims that she would indeed kill if provoked.
Ace shows Kane how she and Garundel travelled to the Mother's Milk Benevolent Association's orphanage where the children, kept silent by negation fields, tied the two of them up to be questioned by Mother Finsey. She also met with Vienna in a restaurant, but Vienna refused to hear her out and was killed in an attack by the Dark Citizens, the reality-destroying enemy that Ace is trying to fight. Whilst Kane does not believe that the Dark Citizens can be defeated, the Master, who got Garundel and the Mother to join the cause, assures him that he can.
Kane joins the group to protect his way of life and Ace explains that the Dark Citizens are acting under the orders of the person that they need to defeat, somebody far more dangerous and feared than the Master, the Mother, Kane or Garundel. Inside the TARDIS, Ace presents this threat: the Doctor, who asks about the state of his universe.
Part three
On Gallifrey, the Doctor, as President of the High Council, visits the captive Krasi President, watches a religious war on Hemera which he decides not to put an end to and gets an update on the Thals, who are living in peace in the absence of the Daleks. He is contacted by President McShane, the version of Ace whom he deemed best-suited to hold the human race back from developing advanced technology per his plans to keep Earth safe, and he advises her not to worry about the other version of herself out there.
The Krasi President reflects on how she feared for her position when she destroyed an island on Krasi Major under the mistaken belief that the residents were making chemical weapons when, in truth, they were making fertiliser. The Doctor claims that he has no such concerns as he is able to continually rewrite history to ensure a good outcome and is not worried about the possibility of the Krasi coming for their President, explaining that they have already made an attempt and he had them wiped out of existence. Privately, he admits to the Dark Citizens that he doubts himself.
Returning to the planet of the Tuffleshrews, who cannot speak but whom he likes to talk to, the Doctor finds the corpse of the exiled Braxiatel and leaves him to be devoured by birds. He visits Hemera, now at peace thanks to his interference in the planet's history, and puts one of the orchids he admires so much in his buttonhole. He declines a Hemeran's offer of lemonade as he is always too busy, although he always has time for orchids.
Part four
Mel and Benny head across the dying planet, experiencing time shifts and avoiding Ogrons installed with cranial leashes which cause them pain until they complete their tasks, and enter a series of caves in search of a machine Ace asked them to recover. Having a data pad connected to the Matrix, Benny informs Mel that they are on the original Gallifrey and that the Celestial Intervention Agency buried the machine beneath the Panopticon due to its reality-warping powers being capable of preventing its own destruction through time shifts.
The pair of them fall into a pit of batsnakes whilst using a gravity grapple and damage their torches, so they use the light from Benny's data pad to keep the creatures back and light their way. They find the machine, the Quantum Possibility Engine, and decide to use it to warp reality and transport themselves to the surface with it. However, it vanishes as Hob arrives with one of his Ogron slaves. The vengeful Hob orders the Ogron to kill Mel and Benny, neither of whom know who he is despite his grandiose introduction.
Part five
Hex and Sally get Cassie to take Damo and Evie to school so they can talk about Ace, whom Sally believes is a figment of his imagination, and Lysandra, whose Global Security soldiers President McShane has replaced with an elite alien force. Afterwards, Hex joins Miss Peters in chaperoning Cassie's class's visit to the Government Hub and is concerned to learn that Cassie has a private audience with President McShane to discuss her ideas about energy. He refuses to allow her to go and attempts to call Sally, but a security guard destroys his phone and locks him up.
The Doctor observes the meeting with Cassie and tells President McShane that he is impressed by Cassie, whom he intends to use against Hex and Sally. President McShane then shows the imprisoned Hex Cassie drinking milkshakes on the other side of one-way glass and reveals that she has the same dreams that he does, elaborating on them in her office and reminding him of the Doctor. As the Doctor's voice tells him to relax, President McShane subjects him to a machine and he passes out.
Sally learns from Lysandra that they have been permanently reassigned to protecting the coast and joins her in flying Pegasus One to a secret security compound in Jersey. On the way, Sally asks Lysandra about gaps in her memory from their time together in the old days, but Lysandra brushes her concerns off for the moment. They are caught by a Sontaran and incapacitate him by hitting his probic vent, although neither can explain how they recognised the Sontarans nor how they know their weakness. They help their captive colleagues escape from the Sontarans and Lysandra demands an audience with their leader, Marshal Stenn. He kills her and threatens to do the same to Sally if she does not surrender.
Part six
Using a stasis lock, the Mother freezes a number of the Time Lords remaining on the barely-populated Gallifrey and she, Ace, the Master, Garundel and Kane, wearing a thermal buffer suit to protect himself, infiltrate the Capitol. The Master argues with Ace's plan to go to the Vault Archives and instead goes to the record room to collect his data extract, after which they break into the Vault Archives, only for the Master to lock everybody inside and join the Doctor in the observation room. The group find what Ace was looking for: a passage to the Dark Universe through which she forces the others to go before she follows.
The Doctor and President McShane use a reality diffuser and give Hex back the memories of his first few months of adventures in the TARDIS, up to when he was shot. When he becomes conscious, President McShane summons Cassie, whom she wants to join her and the Doctor in protecting Earth from the wider universe. Stenn informs her that he has Sally captive and she uses the reality diffuser to make Cassie believe that her parents are both traitors, giving her the choice of which of them is to be executed for their joint crimes.
Mel claims that Hob will be unable to find the Quantum Possibility Engine without her and Benny, but Hob shoots and kills Benny and demands that Mel hands it over. Elsewhere, the Doctor reminisces about those he has lost and how one can never give up on trying to hold the universe together. Whenever things seem to be as bad as they can possibly be, however, he assures the person to whom he is speaking that things can always get much worse.
Cast
Part one
- The Doctor - Sylvester McCoy
- Ace / President Ace - Sophie Aldred
- Mel Bush - Bonnie Langford
- Benny Summerfield - Lisa Bowerman
- Hex Schofield - Philip Olivier
- Sally Morgan - Amy Pemberton
- The Master - Geoffrey Beevers
- Kane - Edward Peel
- Mother - Richenda Carey
- Garundel - Stuart Milligan
- Lysandra Aristedes - Maggie O'Neill
- Marshal Stenn / Klant / Sontarans / Ogron 2 - Dan Starkey
- Hob - Wayne Forester
- Vienna - Chase Masterson
- Cassie Morgan-Schofield - Lizzie Annis
- Dark Citizen / Krasi President / Miss Peters / Time Lord 2 / Computer Voice - Lin Sagovsky
- Ogron 1 / Hemeran / Fabbi / Cleric / Guard / Time Lord - Alex Jordan
- Screen Announcement / Recorded Announcement / Security / Soldier / Waiter / News Announcer - Antony Hoskins
Worldbuilding
- The sentient hotels on Ungar have started to eat their guests.
- Hex and Sally have children named Damien and Evie.
- Sally is a CO.
- Hex is a healthcare manager.
- During their travels with the Seventh Doctor, Sally and Lysandra battled the Sontarans.
- Ace has an entirely ceramic flamethrower.
- Ace asks for a Shirley Temple.
- Irving Braxiatel got President McShane through the Academy.
- The Krazi President destroyed an island off the southern coast of Armitrage on Krasi Major.
- Benny likes sharks.
- Lysandra works for Global Security.
- Miss Peters checks that Tristan has a sick bag.
- Miss Peters has spicy falafels.
- Kane wears a thermal buffer suit.
Notes
- This story was recorded 11-12, 14, 17-19 July and 24 August 2023 at The Soundhouse.
- The trailer for the first half of the story was not released until 22 April 2024.[1]
Continuity
- Ace mentions that she used to work for Kane, as depicted in TV: Dragonfire [+]Loading...["Dragonfire (TV story)"].
- Benny refers to Mel’s previous use of the Quantum Possibility Engine, as occurred in AUDIO: The Quantum Possibility Engine [+]Loading...["The Quantum Possibility Engine (audio story)"].
- Hex remembers his first encounter with the Seventh Doctor and Ace (AUDIO: The Harvest), as well as meeting Florence Nightingale (AUDIO: The Angel of Scutari) and falling in love (AUDIO: Signs and Wonders).
Cover gallery
Part One textless cover
Part One alternate cover
External links
- Official The Last Day page at bigfinish.com
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