Dream Team (audio story)

A protected wonder of space is being exploited for 'company away days' but when the Doctor, Tegan, Nyssa and Adric land to challenge the organisers, they fall into a web of perfectly tailored nightmares. As the Doctor confronts one of the most dangerous monsters in existence, one that uses your own mind against you while it feeds, his companions fall deeper into the trap and a nasty truth is revealed – you can die in dreams.

Plot

Part one

The TARDIS is targeted by a hard sell virus from the protected Trine Archipelago which broadcasts an advertisement for Concordium's corporate away days all over the ship, waking Nyssa up despite her sleeping in the delta wave augmenter. Even when the Doctor manages to stop it, he, Nyssa, Adric and Tegan continue to hear it due to the earworm technology and he flies the TARDIS to the archipelago due to it having been closed to tourists for years. The travellers are subject to what seems to be an antiseptic gas when they arrive at Concordium and the Doctor leaves his three companions in reception whilst he looks around, but they and the TARDIS are gone by the time he gives up on finding anybody. He finds Nyssa on the beach and wakes her up from a dream given to her by a Kantrofarri of Adric and Tegan killing animals.

Adric and Nyssa run from exploding hailstones after Adric attempts to operate a computer and run through a door into a rainforest which Tegan recognises as Cape Tribulation, somewhere she and her mother were once caught in a hailstorm. They deduce that their minds must be being read and attempt to return to the TARDIS, but the door has vanished and Tegan hears her mother, whom she refuses to leave behind. The Doctor and Nyssa search for them, only to realise that they are both dreaming and wake themselves up by slapping one another. They wake up to find that Adric and Nyssa, as well as numerous other visitors, have Kantrofarri on their faces and they use mathematics to distract themselves from thinking about and attracting the Kantrofarri.

To save Adric and Tegan, the Doctor allows himself to be attacked by a Kantrofarri to enter the same state and convinces them that they are dreaming. A boar runs at the three of them and the Doctor believes that they will wake up as a result of the near-death experience, but multiple Nyssas appear and claim that they can show them the way out. The Doctor assures Adric and Tegan that nobody can die in a dream when one of the Nyssas points a gun at them. Despite this claim, Nyssa fires at him.

Part two

The Nyssas all disappear and Tegan goes looking for the real one whilst Adric tries to wake up the Doctor, only for another Doctor to arrive and explain that one can die in a dream and Adric has subconsciously brought them to a dream-version of Alzarius. The pair wake up by focusing on reception and the Doctor finds Nyssa distracting herself with maths to avoid attracting the attention of Kantrofarri which, unlike the others he has encountered, have intact stingers allowing them to feed on brains. Adric is attacked by a Kantrofarri and is reunited with Tegan in a dream of a war-torn Brisbane where she is determined to save her family.

to be completed

Cast

Worldbuilding

The Trine Archipelago is a planetary archipelago and a protected natural wonder.
The facility uses hard sell technology.
Tegan once walked into the web of a huntsman spider and got bitten.
Adric does not know how to make an apple crumble.
The TARDIS informs the Shadow Proclamation of the Porcians.

Notes

Unusually for a Big Finish full-cast audio story, all speaking parts are played by the main cast: Peter Davison, Matthew Waterhouse, Sarah Sutton and Janet Fielding.

Continuity

Nyssa has been sleeping in her TARDIS bedroom using the delta wave augmenter. (TV: Kinda ^[+]Loading...["Kinda (TV story)"], PROSE: The Sands of Time ^[+]Loading...["The Sands of Time (novel)"])

External links

Official Dream Team page at bigfinish.com