The Toy (audio story)

The Toy
Doctor:	Fifth Doctor
Companion(s):	Nyssa, Tegan, Adric
Main setting:	Arcadia, Gallifrey; The Doctor's TARDIS
Key crew
Publisher:	Big Finish Productions
Writer:	Nigel Fairs
Director:	Lisa Bowerman
Producer:	Michael Stevens
Music:	Toby Robinson
Read by:	Sarah Sutton
Cover by:	Anthony Lamb
Release details
Release date:	October 2015
Format:	CD

The Toy was an audio story released solely to online subscribers of The Complete History magazine, alongside issues #4 and #5 of the magazine. It was read by Sarah Sutton.

Publisher's summary

In her bedroom on board the TARDIS, Nyssa dreams of her long lost home, and a Forbidden Archway that never really existed — or did it?

In the TARDIS corridors she finds a flight of steps, a door marked 'keep out', and beyond, a locked room full of secrets. In particular a casket containing a jewel seems to call to her. “Nyssa of Traken, do you want to be my friend?”

So begins a journey that takes Nyssa from snow capped mountains to vast cities, and introduces her to people she seems to know so well. What dangerous landscape has she wondered into — and can she ever escape to safety, and the comfort of her travelling companions?

Plot

to be added

Characters

• Fifth Doctor
• Nyssa
• Tegan Jovanka
• Adric
• The Master
• First Doctor
• Susan Foreman
• Second Doctor
• Third Doctor
• Fourth Doctor
• Sixth Doctor
• Seventh Doctor
• Eighth Doctor

References

• Satona chlorensis was a flower that grew on Traken.
• Nyssa dreams that Tegan is her chambermaid.
• The Doctor's TARDIS contains a replicator that can copy clothing.
• As a child, Nyssa spent many hours studying etiquette when she would have preferred to have been playing with other children.
• The First Doctor once planned to live in Arcadia with his granddaughter Susan Foreman.
• Both of Nyssa's grandfathers died before she was born.
• The First Doctor always wanted to visit Traken.
• The Master refers to the Prydonian Chapter as "hippies".
• Adric once described Tegan as being "unreasonably highly strung".
• The Doctor retains a jewel that Susan used to own, which was given to her by the Master.
• Adric says a computer program called The Facebook was banned on 21st century Earth for turning people into "mindless, incommunicative zombies".

Notes

Short Trips Rarities cover

• The Toy was originally advertised in Vortex #66 and #67 as part of Big Finish's monthly Short Trips range for release in May 2015, before being replaced by The King of the Dead. Whilst early promotional material retained the Short Trips title on the cover, this was dropped for the final release.
• The CD also features a behind the scenes featurette on Big Finish as a company, Inside the Audio Worlds of Doctor Who, with trailers and interviews with Jemma Redgrave, Ingrid Oliver, Katy Manning, Tom Baker, Russell T Davies and Paul McGann, and narrated by Nicholas Briggs and David Richardson. Some of these interviews are repurposed from previous releases.
• Offered as a CD exclusive, it is one of Big Finish's few releases since the introduction of downloads in 2008 to not be available in a non-physical format.
• It is the first release exclusive to a magazine since The Revenants in 2012.
• On 30 September 2016, this story was made available for general release as part of the Short Trips Rarities range.

Continuity

• Nyssa has a dream about the Melkur and her father Tremas and mother. (TV: The Keeper of Traken)
• Nyssa recalls the Decayed Master stealing Tremas' body (TV: The Keeper of Traken) and the destruction of Traken in 1981 (TV: Logopolis).
• Nyssa refers to Tegan's bad experiences with dreaming when she was possessed by Mara on Kinda. (TV: Kinda)
• There is snow on Gallifrey. (TV: Gridlock, The Sound of Drums)
• Adric and Tegan do not know who Susan is. Tegan would later meet her in the Death Zone on Gallifrey. (TV: The Five Doctors)
• Nyssa asks if the Master is still out there. The Doctor says that he has a habit of surviving. (TV: Castrovalva, Time-Flight)
• The Doctor says that the Master could not bear a universe without him to cross swords with. He suggests this could be why the Master left Gallifrey in the first place. (TV: The Five Doctors)

External links

• Official The Toy page at bigfinish.com
• http://www.hachettepartworks.com/our-titles/dr-who/