The Yearn (audio story)

The Yearn was the second story in the audio anthology All of Time and Space, produced by Big Finish Productions. It was written by Angus Dunican and featured Jacob Dudman as the Eleventh Doctor and Safiyya Ingar as Valarie Lockwood.

Publisher's summary
The people of Medrüth are under siege. Forced into underground bunkers, the Medrüthians are desperate for a way to escape. When the Doctor and Valarie arrive, it seems like they’ve finally got everything they wanted. Except, that's when the nightmares really begin.

Plot
The Doctor and Valarie arrive in an underground research base on Medrüth and are almost immediately held at gunpoint by Hoster and Roanna, who have been stuck with Wyler and want to escape. However, the TARDIS disappears. Hoster, Roanna and Wyler explain that they cannot leave the base due to the Yearn outside, which resemble panthers made of energy, and that their colleagues have been disappearing without explanation. They agree to help search for the TARDIS, but Hoster has the Doctor and Valarie locked away for the night.

Escaping captivity, the Doctor and Valarie hear Hoster, Roanna and Wyler being taken by the Yearn and head to the Research and Development area where they finish a weapon to defeat the creatures and build traps for them. Hoster, Roanna and Wyler are somehow restored with no memory of what happened to them and place traps around the base, after which Valarie and Roanna share a romantic moment and kiss. Valarie hears voices and the sound of the TARDIS and a Yearn emerges from Roanna. The Doctor traps it and takes Valarie and Roanna to find Hoster and Wyler, from whom two further Yearn emerge.

The Doctor is taken by the Yearn and finds himself with the TARDIS. The gestalt mind of what became the Yearn explains that they became the Medrüthians, but they felt a loneliness, the Yearn, which dragged them away from their physical forms and they are now unable to stop them. It was only thanks to the TARDIS taking up so much space that Hoster, Roanna and Wyler were returned. Inside the TARDIS, the Doctor receives a telephone call from the Yearn demanding that he leaves, but he refuses and uses the telepathic circuits to contact Valarie, telling her that the loop will break when the TARDIS returns to Medrüth.

The Yearn adapt and become invulnerable to the traps laid for them, but the Doctor uses the TARDIS to take the Yearn away, restoring everybody that they took. The Doctor tells Valarie that she is welcome to remain behind to stay with Roanna, an offer which she declines as she knows so little about her. Instead, she gives Roanna the number of the TARDIS telephone in case there is a Yearn emergency or if she ever needs somebody to talk to. They kiss.

Cast

 * The Doctor - Jacob Dudman
 * Valarie Lockwood - Safiyya Ingar
 * Roanna - Mia Tomlinson
 * Hoster - David Dobson
 * Wyler - Mark Rowley
 * Entity / Yearn - Sam Clemens

Continuity

 * The Doctor says that some of his best friends decided to settle down with people that they just met. (TV: The Myth Makers, The Green Death, The Invasion of Time)
 * As examples of gestalts, the Doctor mentions Axos, (TV: The Claws of Axos, etc.) the Fendahl (TV: Image of the Fendahl, etc.) and the Nestenes. (TV: Spearhead from Space, etc.)