The Rotting Deep (audio story)

The Rotting Deep was the first story in the audio anthology Water Worlds, produced by Big Finish Productions. It was written by Jacqueline Rayner and featured Colin Baker as the Sixth Doctor, Bonnie Langford as Melanie Bush and introduced Ruth Madeley as new companion Hebe Harrison.

Publisher's summary
A mysterious SOS summons the Doctor and Mel to an oil rig in the North Sea where a dwindling group of survivors awaits rescue from a lethal menace. One of their number is Hebe Harrison, a wheelchair-using marine biologist who is definitely more than she seems. Can our heroes escape the rig? And just what is killing off the rig's beleaguered crew?

Part one
The Doctor finally manages to find the source of an SOS: a mobile phone from the 2000s, connected to the TARDIS. Following it, the Doctor and Mel arrive on a powerless oil rig called in the North Sea called Albatross Alpha and fail to save a man from falling to a height due to aggressive gulls. They meet marine biologist Hebe and are introduced to Jonah, Sky, Carl and A.M., all of whom Mel admonishes for not helping Hebe, a wheelchair user, join them in the canteen. The sixth person, Bill is working in the power room.

Hebe is irritated by Mel being angry on her behalf and tells the Doctor that she is here to recommend whether or not the rig is to remain; she is currently in favour of it staying due to it serving as an artificial reef, but the divers who went to document the diversity of the wildlife disappeared.

Whilst Sky goes looking for Bill, Mel returns to the Doctor and they share what they have learnt; four divers have disappeared, as have three engineers and three people from the oil company, and all of the food has disappeared or became covered in slime. The others join them, but the impatient Jonah goes outside and survives a fall when the gulls attack. One gets inside and attacks Hebe, but the Doctor grabs it with a jumper and traps it in a wardrobe.

Power returns to the rig and the Doctor heads down to the infirmary with Carl and the wounded Jonah. Mel stays with Hebe and A.M. and is attacked when the gulls break through a window. They swarm A.M., allowing Mel and Hebe to escape and head downstairs in the lift. When the power goes out again, the Doctor goes into the power room to find Sky and Bill whilst Mel and Hebe are trapped in the lift. They hear something slithering above them, trying to get in.

Part two
In the power room, the generator has been smashed to pieces and Bill is dead, his corpse covered in barnacles. The Doctor finds Sky in a cupboard in a state of shock, laughing hysterically, and hears Mel scream. Hebe has prised the lift doors open with her walking stick, allowing Mel to drop down five feet to the floor where she has been stung by a jellyfish. Carl helps get Hebe and her wheelchair down whilst the Doctor has Jonah fetch salt water for Mel's sting. Whilst the Doctor is tending to Mel and discussing aliens and other planets, Hebe overhears them and confronts them, believing them to be mad or in league with aliens.

Sky confesses to the killings and runs outside, shouting that the gulls will not attack her as she is the saviour of the natural world. The Doctor tries to stop her, but she falls into the sea. He returns to Mel and Hebe, who have been discussing time travel, and they learn that Carl has seemingly been devoured by sea stars. The Doctor is concerned given that this should be impossible and that the salt water did not help Mel's jellyfish sting. He wonders if Sky drank from the desalination system and if she and the animals were being affected by some sort of plankton.

Whilst the Doctor and Mel are looking to analyse a sample, Jonah drinks the water and plans to film the octopus that was on the lift murdering Hebe. However, she takes out one of its brains with her walking stick, after which it kills Jonah whilst he, believing it to be dead, mourns it. The Doctor manages to repair the generator and finds that the water contains a unique compound caused by an amalgamation of decades of chemical waste, one for which he will soon be able to make a neutralising agent.

Waiting for a helicopter, Hebe tells the Doctor and Mel how a tutor of hers who loved chocolate cake gave her a button to put on her mobile phone for use in emergencies. The Doctor realises that she is talking about Evelyn and shows her to the TARDIS, demonstrating the alarm for her and agreeing to let her join them on their travels to see the universe.

Cast

 * The Doctor - Colin Baker
 * Mel - Bonnie Langford
 * Hebe - Ruth Madeley
 * Jonah Strong - Rove McManus
 * A.M. - James Smillie
 * Sky Bennett - Mandi Symonds
 * Carl Price / Dean - Charlie Tighe

Crew

 * Cover Art - Claudia Gironi
 * Director - Helen Goldwyn
 * Executive Producers - Nicholas Briggs and Jason Haigh-Ellery
 * Music, Sound Designer & Remote Recording - Steve Foxon
 * Writer & Producer - Jacqueline Rayner
 * Script Editor - Robert Valentine
 * Senior Producer - David Richardson

Worldbuilding

 * There are a number of species of gull which live offshore, but there is no such thing as an actual seagull.
 * Hebe jokes that she is not Vlad the Impaler.
 * Mel is covered in guano.
 * Hebe is the goddess of youth and cupbearer to the gods.
 * There is no tea or coffee on the rig.
 * Elise, Hebe's best friend at university, likes Keats, Shelley and Christina Rossetti.
 * The Doctor quotes Coleridge.
 * The Doctor's coat reminds Hebe of a sea slug. Sea slugs eat poisonous things which they then use to defend themselves.
 * When she was eight or nine, Hebe saw The Little Mermaid and shouted when the main character, Ariel, gave up her tail for legs. Her mother told her that she would not have any ice cream if she did not stop it.
 * Jonah has swum with sharks.
 * Jonah wants to make a documentary on artificial reefs.
 * Dean belonged to Jonah's production company.
 * Sky represents an ecological charity.
 * A.M. is the cook.
 * Carl is the safety officer.
 * Bill is an engineer. Three other engineers have disappeared.
 * Hebe says "suffering seahorses", "holy halibut", "for the love of spoons" and "dizzy dolphins" as expletives. She started saying such things ironically with her friends.
 * Barnacles are tiny crustaceans who secrete a cement stronger than super glue.
 * Hebe has a walking stick.
 * Mel is stung by a lion's mane.
 * The Doctor uses tweezers to remove Mel's stings.
 * For the Doctor's 591st birthday, he visited a planet of coral where he could ride seahorses.
 * At university, Hebe set up a group called the Lame Ducks which included Elise.
 * Starfish are not fish and are more properly called sea stars. They eject their stomachs, envelop their prey and digest it.
 * The Doctor assures Hebe that UNIT will smoothe the matter over, avoiding newspaper headlines.
 * Hebe's parents wanted her to carry an alarm, but she refused as it would be impossible to accessorise.

Continuity

 * Mel worries that there might be a Dalek on the rig. She first met the Daleks in The Juggernauts.
 * Hebe studied at the same university professor Evelyn Smythe used to teach. Hebe talked fondly of Evelyn and the former companion was the reason why Hebe was able to send a S.O.S. to the Doctor. (AUDIO: The Marian Conspiracy et al)