Sweet Salvation (audio story)

 was the fourth and final story in the audio anthology Ravenous 1, produced by Big Finish Productions. It was written by Matt Fitton and featured Paul McGann as the Eighth Doctor, Nicola Walker as Liv Chenka and Hattie Morahan as Helen Sinclair.

Publisher's summary
The Eleven has the authorities in the palm of his hand and an entire world held to ransom when the Kandyman cooks up a deadly confection containing a secret ingredient. In a last-ditch attempt to prevent disaster Liv teams up with a desperate criminal, and the Doctor must decide whether Helen is still his friend.

Plot
The Eleven prepares to receive Ludina Braskell, the governor of Colony 23, the system to which Rykerzon is connected. He poses as the scientific advisor of the Governor (whom he killed), and uses his seventh personality to act as the scientific mind of the project. He welcomes Ludina, saying that the Governor is indisposed, and leads her to the local fabric where the prisoners work to prepare the Kandyman's receipts.

Meanwhile, Helen informs the Doctor and Liv about what happened to the prison; after the Eleven took over, she hid in the tubes of the prison to avoid being caught. Liv believes her, but the Doctor is still suspicious of her. Their discussion is stopped by an enraged and desperate Ruzalla, who grabs Helen at gunpoint and threatens the group: she intends to force them into helping her saving Jarl. The Doctor agrees, and Helen leads them all to a local shuttle.

In the fabric, the Eleven shows Ludina the means used by the Kandyman to manufacture his sweets. He explains to her their flavour comes from the silk produced by the psychic spiders: the Kandyman reworks it into a substance which alters mind, thus ending criminal behaviour. Ludmina is exstatic at the thought of being able to eradicate criminality, but is shocked when the Eleven throws Jarl into a pit full of spiders. The boy has psychic powers, on which the spiders will feed on and produce more silk.

In pain, Jarl unwillingly contacts both the Doctor and Ruzalla, convincing the former to try and save him. The Kandyman informs the Eleven of the Doctor's arrival and of the flight of him and his friends on the shuttle, and the Eleven orders him to shoot them down. As the Kandyman obeys, the Eleven deceives Ludmina, making her think the shuttle was bringing in more prisoners. Ludmina decides to bring them in herself with her guards. Aboard the shuttle, the Doctor manages to escape from the ship with Helen, while Liv is stranded together with Ruzalla.

As Liv and Ruzalla form an uneasy alliance due to Ruzalla's trust issues, the Doctor and Helen are taken by Ludmina's guards and brought to the prison. Interrogating Ludmina, the Doctor comes to know the Kandyman's products are already being distributed to the lower citizens of Colony 23, while the high and mighty have special delivery. He is also informed by Ludmina of Helen's destruction of a ship and a wing of the prison due to the Sonomancer's powers still in her. By the time they arrive to the prison, though, the Eleven reveals his true colours: he has poisoned Ludmina's guards and take both the Doctor and Helen prisoners, before killing Ludmina too using the Ten's psychic powers (it turns out the special delivery too was imbued with the Kandyman's recipes).

Liv and Ruzalla enters the prison only to find a bunch of corpses, which Ruzalla recognises as members of her former gang. She tells Liv he and Jarl grew up together, and share a deep bond of friendship; she is the only person who knows how to calm him down and whom he trusts. Together, the two women enter the fabric and try reaching for where Jarl is kept prisoner, but they are met by the Kandyman, intenting to take care of them himself. Liv tells Ruzalla to go on as he distracts him; in the following fight, she manages to hit it deadly with sour substances, thus making his sugar components go sour: this causes the Kandyman's destruction.

In front of Jarl's webbed prison, the Eleven reveals the Doctor and the Eleven his ultimate plan: using Jarl's powers, amplified by the spiders, he will take over the minds of every people in the colony (they have eaten the Kandyman's receipts, so they have eaten the spider substance allowing the Eleven to connect), gaining for himself an immense power he will use to rule the galaxy. His original plan was to use Helen's powers left to her by the Sonomancer: this helps Helen to definitely give up any hope in his apparent redemption. Ruzalla rushes in and tries to attack the Eleven, but is instead taken hostage by him and used to force Jarl into giving in to the Eleven's demands: the boy connects to his mind and to the people in the colony. Using his own psychic powers, the Doctor connects with Jarl himself, and taking advantage of the Eleven's weaknesses (due to his dissociative disease), unbalances him, thus throwing him into a psychic plane where he is trapped.

For a moment, in the mirror, Liv, Helen and the Doctor seem to notice some foul-looking creatures, which the Doctor calls Ravenous.

With the situation resolved and Ruzalla and Jarl reunited, the Doctor, Helen and Liv help fixing the System, so that the prison can come back to normal. The Doctor asks Helen whether she wants to remain here and help the inmates, but she refuses. The TARDIS leaves, with the Doctor promising his two companions to bring them to a special destination.

On the psychic plane, the Eleven sees the Ravenous approach and, afraid, starts to run away.

Cast

 * The Doctor - Paul McGann
 * Liv Chenka - Nicola Walker
 * Helen Sinclair - Hattie Morahan
 * The Eleven - Mark Bonnar
 * The Kandyman - Nicholas Rowe
 * Ruzalla - Pippa Bennett-Warner
 * Jarl / System - Charlie Condou
 * Ludina Braskell - Beth Goddard

Continuity

 * to be added