Apollo 23 (novel)

Apollo 23 was the thirty-seventh novel in the BBC New Series Adventures series. It was written by Justin Richards and featured the Eleventh Doctor and Amy Pond.

It was notable for not just being the first Eleventh Doctor NSA book, but actually the first Eleventh Doctor book to be released. It is also Amy Pond's first appearance in the NSA series.

Publisher's summary
"Houston – we have a problem."

An astronaut in full spacesuit appears out of thin air in a busy shopping centre. Maybe it's a publicity stunt.

A photo shows an immaculately-dressed woman in her best shoes lying dead at the edge of a crater on the dark side of the moon – beside her beloved dog 'Poochie'. Maybe it's a hoax.

But as the Doctor and Amy find out, these are just minor events in a sinister plan to take over every human being on earth. The plot centres on a secret military base on the moon – that's where Amy and the TARDIS are.

The Doctor is back on Earth, and without the TARDIS there's no way he can get to the moon to save Amy and defeat the aliens.

Or is there? The Doctor discovers one last great secret that could save humanity: Apollo 23.

Plot
While enjoying a stroll on his lunch break, Donald Babinger suffocates to death after being caught up in a quantum displacement field that momentarily transported him to the moon. Doctor Gyles Winterborne arrives on the scene and initially suspects that Babinger's death was the result of a heart attack, however he notices some signs of asphyxiation. Meanwhile, across town astronaut Marty Garrett experiences a reverse displacement as he appears from thin air in a burger bar stunning the customers who put his sudden appearance down to a publicity stunt.

The Eleventh Doctor and Amy Pond land on Earth shortly after and immediately find themselves pulled into the mystery after a chance encounter with Winterborne informs them of Babinger's suspicious death and the presence of an astronaut in the mall. At Base Hibiscus in Texas, General Adam Walinski and Doctor Candace Hecker are among those who are perplexed as to how their displacement technology - which when working properly allowed them to pass to and from Base Diana located on the moon at ease - so wrong. A further headache arises when they receive word of yet more victims of the displacement, Becky Starmer and her dog Poochie, who lie dead on the surface of the moon only to be recovered by Base Diana's team. While watching a video link of the bodies being recovered, the Hibiscus staff are shocked to see a London police box, the TARDIS.

Pretending to have been sent by Hibiscus to fix the displacement link, the Doctor and Amy introduce themselves to various members of Base Diana including: Colonel Cliff Davenish, Major Andrea Carlisle and Captain Jim Reeve. Before long they are paired with Professor Charles Jackson, who has the most knowledge about quantum displacement, and he offers to show them around the Base. One of their last stops was the Process Chamber, Jackson informs the Doctor and Amy that Base Diana holds several prisoners who are deemed too dangerous to be held on Earth due to their knowledge regarding government secrets. These prisoners are being experimented on, undergoing a painful mindwipe, in the hopes of finding a way to rehabilitate them. The Doctor and Amy watch as Jackson and Nurse Phillips perform a mindwipe on Prisoner Nine which goes wrong and causes him to go into shock. The prisoner momentarily acts like he recognises the Doctor before being sedated by Nurse Phillips. His body can't handle the sedation on top of the mindwipe and he dies.

Following this the Doctor instructs Amy to keep a close eye on Nurse Phillips. When she visits Phillips' sick bay she finds that Jackson's former assistant Liz Didbrook is being observed. Didbrook has seemingly suffered a mental breakdown and Phillips tells Amy that she can now only speak nonsense but, like with Prisoner Nine, Amy suspects that her gibberish holds more significance. Elsewhere, the Doctor and Davenish venture out onto the moon's surface to repair the quantum displacement equipment, they are successful and remove their helmets after passing back through to Earth. However, Amy discovers that Jackson and Phillips are villainously planning to sabotage the system again and that they had already done away with Carlisle. Phillips orders a mindless soldier, known to them as a Blank, to sabotage the system and Amy watches helpless as he does so. The Doctor and Davenish are transported back to the moon where they began to suffocate, but the Doctor manages to make it back to Earth while Davenish succumbs to lack of oxygen and dies.

Back on Earth, the Doctor is rescued in the middle of the dessert by the Hibiscus crew and informs Walinski that the moonbase is being sabotaged as part of an invasion. Working with the Hibiscus crew, the Doctor is able to reopen the quantum link to the moon where he is able to recover Davenish's body. The link doesn't last and is permanently destroyed dashing the Doctor's hopes of being able to get back to Base Diana again. However, Hecker reveals that there is another way to the moon - the abandoned Apollo 23 rocket. In less that twenty-four hours the Doctor and the Hibiscus team are able to get the rocket up and running again. The rocket successfully launches with the Doctor, Garrett and pilot Pat Ashton aboard.

On Base Diana, Amy pays another visit to Didbrook where she learns about mysterious goings on at Pod 7. When she investigates she finds five mindwiped Blanks are being primed to receive an upload of alien consciousness. One of the Blanks, Private Dyson, attempts to apprehend her but she manages to fight him off before being found by Reeve. Amy informs Reeve about everything that has been going on and he agrees to confront Jackson and Phillips. While they are confronting Jackson, Reeve reveals that he has already been mindwiped and takes Amy hostage. Reeve puts Amy into solitary confinement, with the help of Carlisle, but she manages to escape and cause a distraction by setting all of the prisoners free.

Aboard Apollo 23, Garrett reveals himself to be a Blank and sets about trying to sabotage the rocket. The Doctor manages to get the better hand and ejects Garrett into the vacuum of space. While Ashton leaves in the rocket to contact Base Hibiscus, the Doctor makes his way to Base Diana. He finds Amy and immediately realises that she has been Blanked. The Doctor and Amy are taken to solitary confinement by Carlisle but she soon reveals that she is still human after her mindwipe failed due to a power surge. The Doctor and Carlisle learn that the aliens are Talerians and take out one of Jackson's technicians Lars Gregman. They locate the area of Base Diana where all of essences of all the Blanked victims are kept. The Doctor find's Amy's phial and orders her to keep onto it, which leads the Blank Amy to drink the contents. Jackson and Reeve locate the trio and use Amy's Blanked instructions to have her take the Doctor and Carlisle hostage. Having drunken the contents of her phial, Amy regains her consciousness and allows the Doctor and Carlisle to escape.

to be added

Characters

 * Donald Babinger
 * Mandy
 * Becky Starmer
 * Poochie
 * Dr. Gyles Winterbourne
 * Sgt. Rickman
 * Captain Marty Garrett
 * The Eleventh Doctor
 * Amy Pond
 * Albert Smoth
 * General Adam Walinski
 * Dr. Candace Hecker
 * Graham Haines
 * Agent Jennings
 * Captain Jim Reeve
 * Colonel Cliff Devenish
 * Professor Charles Jackson/Androparg
 * Major Andrea Carlisle
 * Prisoner Nine
 * Nurse Phillips
 * Liz Didbrook
 * Private Dyson
 * Daniel Bardell
 * Pat Ashton
 * Lars Gregman
 * Commander Raraarg

Continuity

 * The Doctor says he has witnessed many deaths, referring to the fact that death and bloodshed follow in the footsteps of each of his incarnations. (TV: Warriors of the Deep, Resurrection of the Daleks)
 * The Doctor says death spoils his appetite. (TV: Boom Town)
 * The Doctor claims that it has been a number of months since his "death". (TV: The End of Time)
 * UNIT and the Torchwood Institute are referred to. In the former, there appears to be a reference to the Third Doctor.
 * The Doctor says he got his Mars-Venus license. (TV: Robot)
 * Once again, the Doctor instructs someone not to call him 'Doc'. (TV: The Dalek Invasion of Earth, The Time Meddler, The Five Doctors, The Twin Dilemma, The Ultimate Foe, Dreamland)
 * At one point, the Doctor uses the catchphrase of his ninth incarnation, saying: 'That is fantastic.'
 * When blasting off in the rocket, the Doctor once again exclaims: 'Geronimo!' (TV: The End of Time, The Eleventh Hour, The Beast Below, The Big Bang, PROSE: The Forgotten Army, GAME: City of the Daleks)
 * The Doctor implies he's literally been to 'the depths of hell itself', likely a reference to TV: The Impossible Planet / The Satan Pit.
 * The Doctor says he usually carries around a Jammie Dodger, but doesn't find one when patting his pockets, having eaten it in TV: Victory of the Daleks.
 * The Doctor enthuses about how "cool" it was to be a prisoner on the moon. (TV: Frontier in Space)
 * Professor Jackson refers to the "Keller Process" in relation to the "treatments" he's giving the prisoners. (TV: The Mind of Evil)
 * Agent Jennings' boss is called Control, who turns up in a number of Past Doctor Adventures, including PROSE: The King of Terror.
 * The spacesuits the Doctor and Amy wear (with large translucent bubble helmets) are similar to those the Doctor and his companions wore in TV: The Moonbase.
 * The fuel used in Apollo 23 is the M3 Variant designed by the British Rocket Group for the Mars Missions as seen in TV: The Ambassadors of Death.
 * Base Diana uses an information storage system using water. This was last seen in AUDIO: The Genocide Machine.

Editions published outside Britain

 * Published in France by Milady in 2012 as a paperback edition.
 * Published in Italy by Asengard Edizioni in 2014 as a paperback edition.
 * Published in China by New Star Press in 2018 as a paperback edition.

Audiobook

 * This novel was released as an audiobook, in the UK, in October 2010 complete and unabridged by BBC Audio and read by James Albrecht.
 * This novel was also released as an audiobook, in Germany, on 1 March 2019 by Lübbe Audio and read by Tobias Nath.