Wild Animals (audio story)

Wild Animals was the second story in the audio anthology Stranded 1, produced by Big Finish Productions. It was written by John Dorney and featured Paul McGann as the Eighth Doctor, Nicola Walker as Liv Chenka, Hattie Morahan as Helen Sinclair and Rebecca Root as Tania Bell.

Publisher's summary
After weeks of London living, some of the TARDIS crew are finding it easier to adjust than others.

Liv has found a new friend, but Helen is worried about the Doctor.

And when a tragic crime takes place, the Time Lord must learn the limits of his powers.

Plot
Liv is working at Sanjit's convenience store when Helen arrives to put a card offering private history tuition in the window. They discuss the Doctor, who has been moping around and seems to have given up on the TARDIS, and Tania, who Helen notes has been very friendly with Liv.

Liv and Helen have dinner with Aisha and Zakia, but Liv leaves to follow the Doctor and asks about the TARDIS. He says that he has not quite given up yet, which Liv supports, and she returns home where Tania offers her and Helen smart phones. Liv declines and goes to work whilst Helen reintroduces the Doctor to cooking as something to get his situation off of his mind. Helen leaves for the shop to get some missing ingredients.

A man brandishing a gun enters the shop whilst Liv is out back and attempts to rob Sanjit. When Liv sees him, she tries to get the gun and both she and Sanjit are shot. Helen and Zakia find them both and Helen chases after the man, calling the Doctor to go to Liv. Liv and Sanjit, who has fallen unconscious, are taken to the hospital in an ambulance.

At Liv's bedside, the Doctor reminds Helen of the dangers of even normal life and Zakia tells them that Sanjit has died. The two visit DCI Treadwell, whom the Doctor unwittingly insults by saying that his job was child's play and that he himself was a genius. Helen gives a description of the man.

Helen wakes up to find that the Doctor had been awake all night, hacking into the police's systems, and tells her to join him in joining the police at Holloway Road. Before leaving, Helen asks Tania to visit Liv in the hospital in their stead. She does so, informing Liv that Sanjit had died and asking if Liv was in a relationship with the Doctor or Helen.

Having intruded on the police's investigations, the Doctor and Helen meet DCI Treadwell again and ask about their progress, which he refuses to give. Tania texts Helen, telling her that Liv has woken up, but the Doctor chooses to instead investigate on his own. Liv tells Helen what happened in the shop and about the Doctor, who they are at least glad is no longer "mooching around Regent's Park". The Doctor messages Helen, saying that he was doing just that.

Helen meets the Doctor, who believes that the criminal likely lives nearby and has learnt of a number of muggings in the area. He has dressed himself up to look rich in the hopes of being the latest victim in order to catch the mugger. As Helen leaves, she is attacked by a man and saved by the Doctor, who used chilli powder before handcuffing him and putting him under citizen's arrest.

In hospital, Tania returns to Liv with grapes and asks her out for dinner on a date. Liv accepts and is unbothered when Tania tells her that she is transgender.

At the police station, DCI Treadwell tells the Doctor and Helen that the mugger was not the culprit and that the gunman had been arrested three hours earlier, confessing to the crime after the gun was found in his flat. The Doctor and Helen leave and the Doctor tells her that he goes to Regent's Park to see the caged animals at the zoo, feeling kinship with them. She says that things will get better if he continues to try.

The Doctor and Helen visit Liv, who has to pretend to need crutches so as not to raise suspicion of her advanced immune system. She mentions that an aviary at the zoo has been broken into and the birds set free, a mystery that the Doctor says he has no interest in.

Cast

 * The Doctor - Paul McGann
 * Liv Chenka - Nicola Walker
 * Helen Sinclair - Hattie Morahan
 * Tania Bell - Rebecca Root
 * Sanjit - Raj Ghatak
 * Treadwell - Robert Portal
 * Zakia Akhtar - Avita Jay
 * Aisha Akhtar - Amina Zia

Uncredited

 * Mugger - Raj Ghatak (BFX: Wild Animals)

Continuity

 * Helen mentions how Liv had a bad experience with a phone some time ago. (AUDIO: Absent Friends)
 * Liv mentions that the last time she got shot, she just shrugged it off. (AUDIO: Day of the Master)
 * The Doctor mentions when he was working for UNIT. (TV: Spearhead from Space, etc.)
 * Liv says that it has been a while since her last date. (AUDIO: A Life in the Day)