Operation Werewolf (audio story)

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Operation Werewolf was part of the eighth series of The Lost Stories, produced by Big Finish Productions. Although it was numbered as the second story in the series, it was the first to be released.

It was adapted by Jonathan Morris from a storyline submitted by Douglas Camfield and Robert Kitts in 1967.

Publisher's summary[[edit] | [edit source]]

The TARDIS has brought the Doctor, Jamie and Zoe to Normandy in France, not in 1066 as intended, but in 1944, three days before the Allies are due to launch the D-Day landings.

Joining forces with French partisans, they learn that the Germans have been conducting secret experiments at a nearby chateau. These experiments form part of a plan that German high command believe will enable them to win the Second World War. The name of that plan? Operation Werewolf.

Plot[[edit] | [edit source]]

The Secret Army (1)[[edit] | [edit source]]

The Doctor's attempt to take Jamie and Zoe to Normandy in 1066 to watch William the Conqueror's departure and check the accuracy of the Bayeux Tapestry instead lands them in Nazi-occupied France. The trio are separated from the TARDIS, which the Doctor insists must have been pulled off-course, by the approach of Germans looking for an English agent who parachuted out of an aeroplane they were shooting down. In the dark, the Doctor loses his companions and stumbles upon Jules, who has been shot. He attempts to carry him to safety only for the two of them to be caught by the Germans and imprisoned in Saint-Clément where Jules receives medical attention ahead of interrogation.

Jamie and Zoe are found by Jules' daughter Françoise and Pierre, both members of the resistance, and taken to Philippe at their secret base, a farmhouse, to be questioned. Although the resistance agree that they are unlikely to be German spies, they decide to keep them in their custody until they have spoken to the English agent who has come to investigate Professor Richter's research at Château Champ de Camp under Gruppenführer Schneider. Jamie and Zoe keep the Doctor's existence a secret but convince Philippe and Françoise to rescue him and Jules when Pierre learns of their capture from a contact in Saint-Clément.

The Doctor learns from Jules that it is only two days until D-Day and is accused by Kommandant Müller of being the English spy. He irritates Müller by deducing that he had himself posted to France to avoid warfare and is locked up again to await the SS, who send Schneider's aide-de-camp Hauptsturmführer Bruckner to collect the two prisoners. When she arrives at the repurposed school, she tells the Doctor that they have been expecting him.

The Chateau of Death (2)[[edit] | [edit source]]

Having left Zoe at the resistance base, Jamie and Françoise watch as the Doctor and Pierre are taken away by Bruckner and follow them by motorcycle to the château. The Doctor is taken by Schneider to Richter and soon realises that he has been mistaken for the English spy, a scientist whom they wanted to assist Richter in his work on teleportation. Schneider has the technology demonstrated on Jules, who is successfully teleported from one cabinet to another but dies in the process. Jamie and Françoise are soon discovered after infiltrating the château in Nazi uniforms and Jamie is saved by the English spy, Dr Fergus McCrimmon, who proves his identity to the resistance by contacting Sir Aubrey Fanshaw-Smith.

Françoise is captured and locked in one of the teleportation cabinets to force the Doctor to work on the machine to save her life. He quickly grasps its principles and ensures that she survives the teleport, after which Bruckner orders him to make it capable of transporting soldiers to a cabinet across the English Channel. He helps Richter successfully teleport Françoise away and back, her arrival in England confirmed to Bruckner over the telephone, and then teleports Bruckner away after she orders Richter to kill Françoise should she not arrive safely. Whilst Schneider and his soldiers launch a gas attack on the resistance base, Bruckner arrives in the British Secret Weapons Development Centre with Sir Aubrey, who congratulates and welcomes her.

Lair of the Werewolf (3)[[edit] | [edit source]]

When Bruckner thanks Sir Aubrey for sending the Doctor to assist, he informs her that the English agent is with the resistance and that the Doctor is a stranger. She returns to France and threatens to kill the Doctor until Richter convinces her that he could be of use should the teleport experience a malfunction, after which she has the Doctor and Françoise imprisoned instead and updates Schneider. Schneider has captured Zoe and Pierre, but Jamie, Philippe and Fergus remain at large and plan to save them through the drainage tunnel. Sir Aubrey has Richter teleport him to France and is kept company by Bruckner whilst Schneider takes Zoe and Pierre to the Doctor, unaware that Churchill hopes to bomb the château.

Schneider and Richter explain the effects that the gas, supplied by Sir Aubrey from the Special Weapons Development Centre, has had on Zoe and Pierre, namely paralysing them and making them susceptible to suggestion in the vicinity of moonlight. The gas, they explain, is to be released in Britain to convert their soldiers to the Nazi cause in a project called Operation Werewolf. Privately, Sir Aubrey admits to Bruckner that he plans to set himself up as the Führer of a British Reich and she agrees to be at his side when he does so. Zoe, whose claims of being from the City in the 21st century are believed by Bruckner but dismissed by Schneider, and Pierre are brainwashed and the soldiers begin to be transported to England, led by Sir Aubrey and Bruckner. Schneider informs Hitler.

Friend or Foe (4)[[edit] | [edit source]]

Sir Aubrey is questioned by Murchison on Churchill's behalf about the gas and tries to get rid of him after promising Fergus that he would keep the château from being bombed, but Murchison decides to stay. Sir Aubrey converts 80% of his personnel with the gas, informs Schneider of Fergus's plan to infiltrate the château through the drainage tunnel and replaces Hilary with Bruckner as his secretary, after which she tells Murchison that the gas has been being stockpiled. She is shot as she drives away and Murchison is attacked as he calls Churchill's office from a phone box.

When Jamie, Philippe and Fergus arrive at the château, the brainwashed Zoe and Pierre confront them with guns, but neither is able to pull the trigger and their brainwashing is undone. Jamie, Zoe, Pierre, Philippe and Fergus find Françoise in her cell and, learning where the Doctor is, Zoe and Pierre pretend to still be brainwashed to get access to Richter's laboratory. They claim to have killed Jamie, Philippe and Fergus until the three of them follow in Nazi uniform with Françoise and take control, but Richter manages to escape to England in the teleport by taking Françoise hostage. The Doctor hands his TARDIS key to Jamie and goes after Richter, soon finding himself being held at gunpoint by Sir Aubrey.

The Village of Lies (5)[[edit] | [edit source]]

Schneider and his men capture Zoe and Pierre and inadvertently kill Philippe, but Jamie and Fergus manage to escape through the window and Jamie confesses his true identity to Fergus when he recognises Jamie's call of creag an tuire as that of his ancestors. They take refuge in the TARDIS, which the Nazis find and take into the château. Threatened by Schneider, Zoe admits that she is from the 21st century and claims that the Allies will land near Boulogne on 8 June, information which he reports to Berlin. Jamie and Fergus sneak out of the TARDIS, rescue Zoe and Pierre and head to Schneider's office to contact Churchill.

The Doctor uses Françoise's hairpin to get the two of them out of Sir Aubrey's custody and finds Murchison's briefcase in the village, after which a brainwashed constable locks them in a church and alerts Sir Aubrey. Whilst he is away, the Doctor escapes from the church using rope from the church bells and calls Churchill to warn him of Operation Werewolf and Sir Aubrey's treason. He then returns to Françoise and the two of them are taken to Sir Aubrey's office where he implicates him as the one who alerted the War Office, a ploy which Bruckner believes. As Jamie, Zoe, Fergus and Pierre listen from Schneider's office, a gun is fired.

Crossfire (6)[[edit] | [edit source]]

Having been shot by Bruckner before he could kill the Doctor, Sir Aubrey dies and Bruckner takes his place, ordering the Doctor and Richter to increase the range of the SWDC's missiles to hit Westminster with the paralysing gas. She informs Schneider of this new plan, asking him to arrange a bombing of London once the missiles have hit, and finds that the brainwashed soldiers remain loyal to Sir Aubrey and thus hostile to her. The Doctor causes an explosion and releases the gas, allowing him and Françoise, who covers her mouth before finding a gas mask, to escape. Bruckner, soon joined by Richter, fails to contact Schneider as the château is being bombed by the British, which the Doctor learns when he gets in contact with Fergus, who ordered it.

Schneider attempts to use the machine to teleport to England to escape bombardment at the same time that Bruckner and Richter teleport to the château, so the Doctor has Jamie and Zoe press a number of buttons to keep the passengers from colliding and instead deflecting them into the fourth dimension, saving the world from the explosion that would have resulted. The Doctor and Françoise then return to the château and flee with Jamie, Zoe, Fergus and Pierre to the woods, where the TARDIS relocated to because of the HADS, after setting the machine to overload. The Doctor, Jamie and Zoe depart and Fergus, Françoise and Pierre force some Nazis who came across the TARDIS to surrender.

Cast[[edit] | [edit source]]

Crew[[edit] | [edit source]]

Worldbuilding[[edit] | [edit source]]

Notes[[edit] | [edit source]]

Continuity[[edit] | [edit source]]

Cover gallery[[edit] | [edit source]]

  • Textless cover

    Textless cover

  • Alternate cover

    Alternate cover

External links[[edit] | [edit source]]

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The Lost Stories
First Doctor
Second Doctor
Third Doctor
Fourth Doctor
Fifth Doctor
Sixth Doctor
Seventh Doctor
Sara Kingdom
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