The Wake (audio story)
The Wake was the fortieth Bernice Summerfield audio story released by Big Finish Productions. It was the sixth and final story of the eighth season.
Publisher's summary
"What else could you have done?"
"Taken more note of the warnings, I guess. We saw a future Peter once, and he'd become a killer. Ms Jones told me I was doing a lousy job as a mother, and when I didn't listen she stole him from me. Then there was how he was on Montevadros. Even the Oracle of flipping Delphi warned me to be on the look out. And if I'd spent less time knocking about with monsters and magic artefacts, and more time here with him...
This is where you're meant to tell me that I mustn't blame myself."
"You mustn't blame yourself."
"Yeah thanks. I feel so much better now."
Plot
Following Jason's funeral, Benny tries to investigate the circumstances surrounding his death at Peter's hands whilst the Collection becomes increasingly popular thanks to the public's belief that Braxiatel has resumed control. Hass tells her that he allowed Peter inside his encounter suit to survive temporal anomalies and later to fly around his pocket dimension in a pressure suit, which he believes might have contributed to him killing Jason. Benny blames herself as well for not acting after seeing a violent future Peter and for ignoring Ms Jones's concerns about her parenting.
Braxiatel makes himself popular with the students and offers his services as a figurehead for the Collection, claiming that wants no actual power, but Benny does not believe him. Adrian rejects her when she initiates sex with him in an attempt to make herself feel better and she agrees to go to dinner with Doggles after robots attack as part of a plan to work out who has the skills to defend against invasion. Although Benny assumes that Braxiatel is responsible for the drill, Doggles claims responsibility. Adrian looks after Peter and speaks with Joseph, admitting that he feels that his own animosity towards Jason might have led to Peter killing him.
Doggles defends Braxiatel's past actions at dinner and, when Benny changes the subject away from matters concerning Jason, he confides in her that he remembers being killed by the Fifth Axis and that he feels like he is being used as a puppet. He lets slip whilst walking her home that Braxiatel suggested that he seduce her, which angers her, and she pays another visit to Hass to confirm her suspicion that Braxiatel got him to wipe out the Mim. He confesses that he was responsible for the destruction of the Mimsphere and not the Draconians, knowing that it was wrong but having been manipulated by Braxiatel into doing it.
Benny confronts Doggles about him acting on Braxiatel's instruction and, feeling as though somebody is pulling his strings through his Axis-inflicted wounds, he chases her outside to rape her. The defences have been disabled by the Provisional Diet running the Collection and Braxiatel comes to Benny's rescue, knocking Doggles out and taking her to a safe house where Joseph checks her over. She accuses Braxiatel of playing games and says that she would rather leave than the Collection than work for him, but he indicates that Peter, as a murderer, would not be permitted to leave with her. Afterwards, Hass apologises to Braxiatel for telling Benny about the official story about the night is that Benny attacked Doggles.
Adrian and Joseph, who edited the security footage to cover up Benny's meeting with Hass, plan to get Benny off-world by releasing her, editing the security footage and erasing Joseph's memory afterwards, but Benny refuses to leave Peter. Bev, whose message informing her friends that she was alive was intercepted by Braxiatel, arrives on the Collection through a secret door in Hass's pocket universe and invites Benny and Peter to escape the same way, an offer which Benny accepts despite reservations about separating Peter and Adrian. Afterwards, Doggles tortures Adrian for information on Benny's whereabouts and Braxiatel fails to get any answers from Joseph, but he is unconcerned as he knows that Benny will return one day to finish things.
Benny heads out into the universe with Peter to have adventures, accepting that she will have to return the Collection at some point in the future to finish her business with Braxiatel.
Cast
- Bernice Summerfield - Lisa Bowerman
- Bodie - Rex Duis
- Peter Summerfield - Thomas Grant
- Adrian Wall - Harry Myers
- Braxiatel - Miles Richardson
- Doggles - Sam Stevens
- Joseph - Steven Wickham
- Hass - Paul Wolfe
Uncredited cast
Worldbuilding
- Benny says Irving Braxiatel was waiting after the business with Dellah.
- Adrian carves Jason's gravestone.
- A dance version of "Abide with Me" was traditional in Jason's time.
- Joseph has no like finding Mira.
- Peter likes fish fingers.
- Adrian and Bodie are building a new accommodation block with improved plumbing for the students.
- Benny and Braxiatel discuss Napoléon Bonaparte.
- On Hatch's Beard, Benny was sentenced to be hanged for splitting an infinitive. Jason saved her by spreading honey beneath the death squad's corsets, causing their laser nipples to malfunction.
- Doggles remembers being killed by the Fifth Axis.
- Benny wears mascara.
- The Collection is run by the Provisional Diet.
- Benny has some milk with her tea, but no sugar.
- Doggles's mother is dead.
- Braxiatel says that Jason's clones have been "taken care of".
Notes
to be added
Continuity
- Benny recounts her first meeting with Braxiatel in Theatre of War.
- A scene from her wedding is reproduced practically word for word from Happy Endings.
- A scene from Tears of the Oracle is also reproduced.
- Braxiatel hangs up the picture seen on the cover of A Life Worth Living — now missing Ms Jones.
- Hass says that Let There Be Stars happened while Benny was on the Drome in The Worst Thing in the World.
- Benny refers to having seen a grown up and violent Peter (which was the result of a temporal manipulation), which happened in The Grel Escape.
- Doggles mentions he and Benny nearly had sex in Summer of Love.
- Doggles asks about the clones of Jason who appeared in The Final Amendment and Sex Secrets of the Robot Replicants.
- Doggles tortures Adrian using some equipment taken from the Viyrans, who first appeared in Mission of the Viyrans.
- Braxiatel mentions the cave where Avril Fenman resides on the Collection. She previously appeared in The Squire's Crystal, The Glass Prison and Acts of Senseless Devotion.
- At the wake, Adrian mentions what he did in the Fifth Axis occupation including finding a safe place for the hybrid children in Suffer the Children and the resistance, which succeeded in Death and the Daleks.
External links
- Official The Wake page at bigfinish.com
- The Wake at the Doctor Who Reference Guide
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