Professor Bernice Summerfield and the Gods of the Underworld (novel)

, or simply The Gods of the Underworld, was the second full length novel published by Big Finish Productions as part of their Big Finish Bernice Summerfield series. It was written by Stephen Cole.

Publisher's summary
There's a whisper going round that the long-lost temple of the Argian Gods of the Underworld has finally been discovered on the planet Venedel. There's a still quieter whisper that deep inside it lies the Argian Oracle, an ancient artefact that can pinpoint the whereabouts of any soul in the universe. Benny Summerfield sets out to see if the whispers are true ­and if it can tell her the whereabouts of her missing lover. She's got nothing to lose.

Reaching Venedel, Benny finds it under siege from an over-zealous Federation, alleging human rights atrocities and starving the planet out until its people capitulate to its terms. Despite this, a team of Nishtubi mercenaries are running the blockade to supply aid for the Venedelans. But why? They have nothing to gain.

Caught between jingoistic natives, Nishtubi heavies, a plague of ancient killers and the cold, undying secrets of the Gods of the Underworld, Benny and her allies have nowhere to run ­and are left facing nothing but trouble.

Plot
Braxiatel offers to send an expedition to Venedel where the Argians' loot is now believed to have been stored, hidden in a War Temple. However, he is denied by the Earthlink Federation, who are blockading Venedel due to alleged rights violations by the Thane of Mahel and yet have allowed Nishtubi mercenaries to begin excavations there. Braxiatel convinces Benny to go to investigate by telling her of the Argian Oracle, an artefact capable of locating anybody in the universe and which could potentially tell her where Jason is. She agrees.

Benny meets with archaeologists Shell, Arko and Forno at the Pan Leica Spaceport and hires Starl Stanmore to fly them through the blockade. She learns moments afterwards that Starl had ensured that he was the only applicant for the job and he is pursued by the other pilots' angry friends, prompting them all to flee to his ship. As they approach Venedel, the ship hits a cloaked Nishtubi ship and, in the ensuing fire, Shell, Arko and Forno climb into the one remaining escape pod whilst Benny and Starl attempt to safely land the ship. Benny and Starl land in a swamp and narrowly escape before the ship sinks and find a pit containing the charred remains of natives apparently killed by the Thane.

Arko, Forno and the unconscious Shell are captured by the Nishtubi and taken to General Maddaska, who hands them over to Renad and claims that they were trying to steal the food that the Nishtubi had smuggled past the blockade. The Venedelans, who consider all non-humanoids to be animals, intend to eat Arko and Forno, but they manage to escape when Shell awakens and takes a Nishtubi gun; Shell herself is too unwell to escape and Arko and Forno are forced to leave her behind. According to Renad, Shell is dead already and should be burnt.

Benny and Starl find the temple, which the Nishtubi have found their way into using explosives, causing damage. Benny reads the hieroglyphs which tell of a demon god which will rise up and impose its will upon the other gods; she then realises that it has been doctored with synthetic materials which the Argians would not have used. She and Starl continue into the temple and see a demon from whom they flee back outside, deeming it to be the most sensible course of action even if the demon is a hologram. Outside of the temple, they are captured by the Nishtubi.

Arko stuns the guards left outside of the temple and leaves to follow the others whilst Forno remains. Forno surveys the temple, noticing the altered hieroglyphics, and quickly hides when a creature walks past, telling General Maddaska over a communicator about the damage to the temple and that the Earthlink Federation will soon by making its move. Once the creature has gone, Forno watches a woman dressed in gauze float out of the temple and flees when he hears a horrible sound from within.

Benny and Starl are taken away by the Nishtubi to meet the Thane and realise that the Venedelans are being kept in the dark about the value of the artefacts in the temple. The Thane refuses to believe them and has them imprisoned. They later manage to escape by tricking the guard and find a room of Federation equipment which includes a telex printing threats to attack Mahel with nuclear weapons if the Thane does not accede to their demands. They rescue prisoners Dex Tinhar and Han Krista and learn from them that there is a plague on Venedel which the Thane is responding to by burning the infected alive. They are then recaptured by the Venedelans and thrown into a pit full of plague victims, including Shell, to be burnt alive.

The Venedelans find that the Nishtubi flamethrowers do not work. Lizard creatures then burst out of the bodies of the infected, having been incubating inside of them, and the Nishtubi hurry away into the forest with three infected Venedelans. Benny, Shell and Tinhar fall into a tunnel when Arko tries to burrow them out and Arko, Starl and Han flee to the swamp where they see the Nishtubi kill the infected and take the lizards, which are called Ilijah.

Benny awakes to find that Tinhar has left her and Shell for dead. They have fallen into a collapsing underground ventilation system and she finds a plaque marking it as Federation property. When she catches up to Tinhar, she makes him tell her about how the Ilijah are creatures genetically engineered by the Boor, who would release them upon a planet and make money by selling vaccines against them in a scheme which was stopped by the police half a millennium ago. The structure continues to collapse and Benny and Tinhar find their way into the Argian temple.

The following day, Starl notices that the swamp's water level has gone down. Fleeing from a surprisingly large Ilijah, Starl, Arko and Han reunite with Forno at the temple and meet the woman that Forno saw. She falls into Starl's arm and Starl finds that her body shows signs of being subject to long-obsolete invasive surgery. Arko and Forno are attacked by creatures dressed in gauze and bearing the same catheter implants in their wrists that the woman does.

The Venedelans are in a panic because of the situation and Renad overhears Maddaska talking to High Boor Bantagel, hearing about how Maddaska wanted the Nishtubi to continue the Boor's criminal scheme with Venedal serving as a pilot. The grain that the Nishtubi had smuggled through the blockade to the Venedelans contained a drug which made them ideal carriers for the Ilijah and Maddaska has awoken Bantagel from cryo-sleep to make a new immunisation drug. Renad informs the Thane of what he has heard and, as the Venedelans go to have their revenge, Ilijah emerge from the swamp and massacre them. The Thane is killed and there are only a few survivors.

Digging through the tunnel, Benny and Tinhar find their way into an animal pit where Arko, Forno and Han are being attacked by the creatures, which Tinhar identifies as Shik. The Shik kill Tinhar before Benny is able to knock one unconscious and run away with her friends, meeting the woman from the temple who says that she is Janrees, Overseer of Obvion, a planet which was ravaged by the Ilijah. Whilst the Federation had agreed to settle her elsewhere, they abandoned her on Venedel as they do with everything that they wish to be forgotten; their true reason for the blockade is, in fact, to keep their secrets from being revealed.

Han slips away and informs her paymasters that the Federation's past is going to come to light. They tell her to leave as they are fixing the Federation's referendum and, soon enough, Mahel will be destroyed in a nuclear bombardment. When she goes to find the recall device on Tinhar's body, she finds that the Shik have already taken it and tracks them to the temple. Benny and her friends follow her and observe the Shik use the device to reveal Tinhar's escape shuttle which they try to escape in. However, the shuttle explodes. Benny realises that Starl is a secret agent when he accuses Han of being a Shadow Federation agent.

Benny and her friends escape into the temple when the Nishtubi and the Ilijah arrive, making the most of the resulting confusion. She realises that the hieroglyphs show the kingpins of the criminal underworld rather than god demons, one in particular being a Boor. Starl confirms that the Boor collected evidence against the Federation and blackmailed the Shadow Federation into forcing the Boor's rivals into cryogenic suspension. One by one, the Boor would awaken each of the rivals, have them swear their allegiance to them and ultimately form an unstoppable criminal empire. The Shadow Federation, however, elected to keep the Boor in stasis for centuries.

Eventually, Maddaska learnt the truth and awoke Bantagel to resume the Boor's scam with the Ilijah. Something is now wrong with the facility, however, which has resulted in Janrees and the Shik being awoken. Benny wonders why Janrees was being kept with criminals and learns from Han that she is the leader of a notorious criminal syndicate. She then finds that Janrees and Forno have disappeared.

An Ilijah emerges from one of the Nishtubi as they hunt for Benny and her friends and Maddaska demands that Bantagel synthesise a cure. Bantagel has only found cures for species rich enough to pay him for his services. He has awoken the Boor but, when it comes to other species, he intends only to save the criminal leaders whilst leaving the others to die in the Federation's nuclear attack.

The Vendelan survivors arrive at the Nishtubi ship, which seems to be abandoned. Renad, maddened by what has been happening, takes out his frustrations on the rational and non-religious Hoodath, tearing up his official history. Leaving Hoodath behind to mourn the loss of his life's work, Renad leads his people to the temple under the belief that the quakes are a divine warning.

Aware that her paymasters had tried to assassinate her in the explosion of her ship, Han agrees to turn against them. Starl plans to steal the Nishtubi ship and to send a message to his bosses telling them not to bombard Mahel using the communications satellite which was inside his escape pod. Whilst he does this, Benny and Arko go in search of Forno and find Shell in a stasis field, having fallen through the ventilation system into the cryogenic chamber. They also realise that the ship that they arrived in had hit the facility when it crashed into the swamp; the swamp is draining away into the facility and has short-circuited the systems. The entirety of the swamp has now drained away and groups of Ilijah enter the facility through the breach.

Forno, whom Janrees has taken to make use of his keen sense of smell, tells his captor that a power surge might allow her to awaken the other Obvions. She does this without paying attention to Forno's warnings, resulting in Shell being awoken as well. Benny and Arko carry Shelly away.

Bantagel finishes making his cure for humans and then learns that the Boor escape shuttle has been severely damaged by the New Dawn having crashed into it. To escape, he and Maddaska are going to have to use the Nishtubi ship. They enter the facility to release the other criminal leaders from their stasis. The Venedelans fight the Ilijah outside of the temple, giving Starl and Han the opportunity to sneak past and to reach the Nishtubi ship with Hoodath, who distracts the guards in return for his work being restored. However, they forget to collect the pieces and his life's work is destroyed when they fire up the shuttle.

The Nishtubi, who are looking for Benny and her friends, come across the demon projection. They believe that it is a hologram which they placed there to frighten the Venedelans and keep them away, but it starts firing beams from its eyes and kills them and Venedelans alike. It is, in fact, an Argian defence system which seems to have been triggered by all of the activity in the temple.

Bantagel, Maddaska and the Boor arrive at the room where the Obvions have awoken. When the Ilijah enter, Bantagel kils Maddaska before he and his people, as well as the Obvions, flee from them. Benny and Arko encounter them and warn them that Ilijah are approaching from the other direction as well and, when Bantagel mentions that he has a cure, Benny forces him to give it to Shell. They all head deeper underground to find shelter from the imminent nuclear strike and Bantagel tries to use the stasis field to stop the Ilijah; however, the power surge causes further short-circuiting and the resulting explosions destroy the floor, revealing the temple beneath.

Three further demons, which were programmed to defend the temple's treasures, attack the intruders and one of their shots opens a bulkhead. Benny sees the Oracle and wants to get an answer as to Jason's whereabouts, but the facility above crashes into the temple and destroys it. Bantagel uses the field to freeze the Ilijah and, with the treasure destroyed, the demons disappear. Forno uses the field to put the Boor and Obvions into stasis whilst they are celebrating their survival.

Starl is able to stop the bombardment by attacking the Federation fleet, giving him enough time to communicate with his bosses and call off the attack. Han has agreed to give evidence against the Shadow Federation and, with Bantagel's cure, the Federation can wipe out the Ilijah on Venedel. Renad and Hoodath make peace with one another, having accepted that some aliens are trustworthy whilst some are not.

Although Benny has not learnt anything new about Jason, Starl has given the Braxiatel Collection permission to excavate the temple once the cryogenic facility wreckage has been removed. Benny does, however, have to deal with the pilots that Starl had put out of commission.

Characters

 * Bernice Summerfield
 * Irving Braxiatel
 * Joseph
 * Arko
 * Forno
 * Shell
 * Starl Stanmore
 * Hoodath
 * Thane of Mahel
 * Renad
 * Nazan
 * Maddaska
 * Dex Tinhar
 * Han Krista
 * Ukka
 * Antrin
 * Putin
 * Bantagel
 * Janrees

Individuals

 * Benny tries to ask the Argian Oracle about Jason Kane.

Organisations

 * The Earthlink Federation has ties to Earth. It tolerates the Fifth Axis.
 * The Shadow Federation is the name for the corrupt elements of the Earthlink Federation.
 * The Shik syndicate has kept the outer worlds oppressed for over a century.

Planets

 * The Argians built a War Temple on the planet Venedel.
 * Grombi and Obvion are planets.

Species

 * Waskas are rat-like creatures.

Continuity
to be added