The Last Day (audio story)
The Last Day Parts 1-6, also called The Last Day 1 or The Last Day Part One, was an audio anthology including the first six parts of the story The Last Day and comprising the fourteenth release of The Seventh Doctor Adventures, produced by Big Finish Productions. It was written by Matt Fitton and Guy Adams and featured Sylvester McCoy as the Seventh Doctor, Sophie Aldred as Ace, Bonnie Langford as Melanie Bush, Lisa Bowerman as Bernice Summerfield, Philip Olivier as Hex Schofield, Amy Pemberton as Sally Morgan, Maggie O'Neill as Lysandra Aristedes, Chase Masterson as Vienna Salvatori, Wayne Forester as Hob, Geoffrey Beevers as The Master, Stuart Milligan as Garundel, Richenda Carey as Mother Finsey, Lin Sagovsky as Dark Citizen and Edward Peel as Kane.
Publisher's summary
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 them 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, but 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.
Part five
to be added
Part six
to be added
Cast
- The Doctor - Sylvester McCoy
- Ace / President Ace - Sophie Aldred
- Melanie Bush - Bonnie Langford
- Bernice 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.
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
Textless cover
Alternate cover
External links
- Official The Last Day page at bigfinish.com
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