Dragons' Wrath (audio story)

Dragons' Wrath was the sixth and final audio story published by Big Finish Productions in the first season of their Bernice Summerfield series. It was the final Big Finish adaptation of a Virgin New Adventures novel until 2012's Love and War.

The story featured a performance by Richard Franklin, better known for his role of Captain Mike Yates of UNIT in televised Doctor Who.

Publisher's summary
The warlord Gamaliel from the legendary Knights of Jeneve captured the Gamalian Dragon,­ a jewel-encrusted statuette, after the Battle of Bocaro. It is now sought by Romolo Nusek, apparently Gamaliel's descendant, to prove his right to assume his ancestor's mantle as ruler of the Sector.

When Benny joins a group seeking to find the legendary statuette, she has a secret. No one can possibly find one on Stanturus because she's already carrying it ­left for her by a murdered colleague.

The trouble is, the expedition does find one and, as a result, most of them are mysteriously slaughtered. Benny realises she and historian Nicholas Clyde must discern the traitor in their midst. Could it be Gilder, the obsequious administrator from Benny's own university? Could it be Truby Kamadrich, the famous archaeologist? Or might it be the bizarre librarian Reddick, who never leaves Nusek's vaults, protected by an inhospitable volcano?

Plot
After being kicked out of a bar, Benny finds Professor Newark Rappare bleeding in an alley and staunches his gunshot wound. Before he dies, he mentions a dragon and the name "Mastrov" and tells her to take his key card, which she uses it to enter his art studio at St Oscar's and take a dragon statuette. She attends a meeting at which Dr Truby Kamadrich asks her and Dr Nicholas Clyde to take part in an excavation on Stanturus Three funded by Romolo Nusek, whose integrity Nicholas questions. He informs Benny that Nusek is descended from Hugo Gamaliel, who stole the Gamalian Dragon statuette.

Benny takes Nicholas to her rooms and shows her the Gamalian Dragon, which bewilders him as he knows the statuette to be in the archives on Tharn and almost impossible to be replicated given how rarely it is seen by any but Nusek. To solve this mystery and Rappare's death, Benny and Nicholas accept Kamadrich's offer and meet Nusek, accompanied by St Oscar's accounts manager Mappin Gilder to ensure that they do not jeopardise the funding that Nusek is offering the university. Benny and Nicholas get permission to see the Gamalian Dragon and are given a tour of the archives by Reddick, who tells them that it has not been removed for two centuries nor have there been any attempts to steal it. However, Benny notices that the velvet it rests on is slightly disturbed.

Benny and Nicholas sneak back into the archive and are attacked by a cryvok, an android Rottweiler, which Nicholas hits with Benny's backpack. She switches Nusek's dragon with Rappare's and flees from two other cryvoks and meets Nicholas in the library where, comparing a bookcase to its depiction in a painting, Benny discovers a secret passageway and are welcomed by Reddick to his cavern. Reddick has been collecting books that Nusek wants destroyed due to them being critical of Gamaliel and leads Benny and Nicholas out in time for them to board the shuttle to Stanturus Three. During the journey, Benny compares Nusek's dragon with a hologram of Rappare's and confirms that they are completely identical.

On Stanturus Three, Benny is bitten by rat creatures and forced to stay in bed. She uses her computer to analyse Gamaliel's famous victory in the Battle of Bocaro and finds that it cannot work out how he could have defeated the Knights of Jeneve. She waits to hear from Nicholas, but he and several other members of the team are apparently killed in an explosion which destroys the ruins they were examining. When Benny looks at the footage, however, she finds that Nicholas is alive and locates him, unconscious. He tells her that a spaceship bearing Nusek's emblem was behind the explosion and they did not find anything in the ruins, but Kamadrich claims that they found a Gamalian Dragon. Nicholas is made a scapegoat and arrested.

to be completed

Cast

 * Bernice Summerfield - Lisa Bowerman
 * Romolo Nusek - Richard Franklin
 * Nicholas Clyde - Nigel Fairs
 * Truby Kamadrich - Jane Burke
 * Mappin Gilder - Gary Russell
 * Reddick - Jez Fielder

Continuity
to be added