Ichor (home video)
- You may be looking for the substance or the individual.
Ichor was a P.R.O.B.E. webcast released as a download by BBV Productions on their new website in 2021. It was notable for featuring more extensive location shooting than most Case Files to date, which had largely consisted of Bill Baggs as Giles reading in front of a blank wall.
Publisher's summary[[edit] | [edit source]]
Giles contends with the blood of the Gods.
Plot[[edit] | [edit source]]
On the morning of 2 February 2021, after a "long night", Giles begins recording his video diary on-site at "the local cemetery", but winds up unable to explain much before he gets back to P.R.O.B.E. HQ. There, having downed the requisite cup of coffee, he records his actual case file, explaining how P.R.O.B.E. was left a case by Liz before she went back to Spain for a week.
The case initially seems mild, consisting of keeping an eye on a "misguided friend of a friend" of Liz's, a young woman called Sally, who'd gotten mixed up with a group of sanguinarians — recreational, consensual, non-supernatural blood-suckers. P.R.O.B.E. doesn't usually bother these people, who are merely humans with an odd hobby or compulsion, and nothing to do with actual vampires; indeed, Sally seemed to having a good time with the group at first.
However, over the last few weeks, things have gotten more concerning following the arrival of a new member of the group, a mysterious, charismatic young man calling himself Ichor. In fact, Sally was the only one to hold back from drinking Ichor's blood whenever he offered himself up as donor to the group, noticing something strange about the hypnotic pull he had on the sanguinarians, not to mention the almost drug-like effects consuming his blood had on them. Eventually, a session during which all but Sally had partaken of Ichor's bood turned into an actual orgy; made uncomfortable by the turn of events, Sally attempted to leave.
At the door, she was greeted by Ichor himself, who, despite his odd demeanour, explicitly offered her the chance to leave; entranced by him, she declined — and that is as far as Sally now remembers, having woken up the following morning at the cemetery Giles has been investigating, knowing she'd had sex with Ichor after drinking his blood, but unable to remember anything else. It was then, unsettled, that she checked into a hospital, and not before calling upon Liz's acquaintance to get her bearings. In fact, events have since proven Sally to be pregnant, evidently with Ichor's child.
Subsequently, however, Ichor is found dead, his body hanging from a tree in the cemetery. This is what Giles's team spent the night investigating, once the normal authorities were done with their own investigations. Via meditation, Azacca Dixon eventually detects the thoughtwaves of a spited ghost. The team, who already suspected a connection to Greek mythology due to the word "ichor" being a term connected to bloodlines and immortality within said mythology, learn the truth: "Ichor" was a Greek immortal who had entered a deal with a ghost. While the ghost helped Ichor gain a "stepping stone to the mortal plane" once again, hoping to use the opportunity experiment with ambrosia to make it non-toxic to humans, it had secretly tricked Ichor into a lopsided agreement which forced Ichor to leech life-force from the sanguinarians even as they fed on his blood, then transfer that power to the ghost. Ichor had long grown unhappy with the deal, but only became willing to killing himself (via hanging, a ritually significant death with severed the psychic bond with he ghost) after he had gotten Sally pregnant — which ensured the continuation of his bloodline on the mortal plane.
With the P.R.O.B.E. team agreeing to keep an eye on Sally and the baby in the coming years, Giles fills Liz in on the situation, and he signs off from the video diary with the intention of picking her up at the airport, with Liz having expressed a desire to speak with Sally personally following these trying events. Giles is left brooding on his oddly parental instincts towards both Sally and Ichor, and decides that he should channel them into getting in touch with his niece Harriet again.
Cast[[edit] | [edit source]]
Uncredited cast[[edit] | [edit source]]
Characters[[edit] | [edit source]]
Crew[[edit] | [edit source]]
- Writer - James Hornby
- Script editor - James Hornby
- Art - Warren Lewis
- Theme - Mark Ayres
- Logo - Lucas Kovacs
- Editing and Post-production - Callum Brown and Bill Baggs
- With special thanks to James Hornby, James Wylder and Hunter O'Connell at Arcbeatle Press
- Liz Shaw used with the kind permission of the BBC.
Worldbuilding[[edit] | [edit source]]
- Giles quotes folk wisdom that coffee "thickens the blood".
- The pregnant Sally begins to get cravings for pickles.
Story notes[[edit] | [edit source]]
- Ichor was depicted via several photos of an uncredited Warren Lewis, a frequent BBV Productions contributor. Sally was similarly depicted through photos of a real person rather than illustrations, but the model remains, as of yet, unidentified by this Wiki.
Continuity[[edit] | [edit source]]
- Liz Haggard returns to the UK on 2 February 2021, having spent a week in Spain. Spain was where she moved with Patricia Haggard following the events of HOMEVID: When to Die [+]Loading...["When to Die (home video)"], as per the ending of that film; her departure from the United Kingdom towards the end of January follows on from her presence earlier in the month as seen in HOMEVID: Sherwood Sorceress [+]Loading...["Sherwood Sorceress (home video)"], which took place earlier in that month and ended with her intending to spend a while in Cambridge to catch up with her son Simon and his household.
- Giles references "[his] niece", i.e. Harriet King from AUDIO: Broken Bonds [+]Loading...["Broken Bonds (audio story)"].
- Deities from Greek mythology had previously been shown to exist within the Doctor's universe in such stories as PROSE: Deadly Reunion [+]Loading...["Deadly Reunion (novel)"] and COMIC: The Life Bringer! [+]Loading...["The Life Bringer! (comic story)"].
External links[[edit] | [edit source]]
- Official Ichor page at bbvproductions.co.uk
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