The White Wolf (audio story)

The White Wolf was the sixth Sarah Jane Adventures audiobook released. It was written by Gary Russell, produced for BBC Audio and read by Elisabeth Sladen. It accompanied the CBBC broadcast of series 3.

Publisher's summary
A mysterious letter sparks off another adventure for Sarah Jane, in this exclusive audio story read by Elisabeth Sladen.

When Sarah Jane receives a strange letter from Eddison Clough, her curiosity is aroused. For Eddison possesses a photograph proving he was once close friends with her Aunt Lavinia – but he has no memory of ever having met her.

Intrigued, Sarah Jane and Luke go to visit him and, with Clyde, and Rani, they explore the village of Wolfenden. The locals seem strange and secretive – especially the Hendricks, a deathly pale family with white hair and white eyes.

What is lurking in the underground caves? What is the significance of the white wolf carved on the hillside? And what does it all have to do with alien abduction?

Plot
One November morning Sarah Jane Smith receives a strange letter from Eddison Clough. Eddison possesses a photograph with Lavinia Smith and Sarah Jane. He tells Sarah that he was close friends with Lavinia and has met Sarah Jane – but neither Sarah Jane nor Eddison have any memory of these events. Sarah Jane and Luke decide to go to Wolfenden, where Eddison lives. They want to find out what has caused the memory loss.

At the village Sarah Jane and Luke first meet Ben Hendrick who gives a fruit basket to them. Ben already knows about Sarah Jane. He read some articles about her in the internet, which were put in there by Mr Smith. These articles state that Sarah Jane is a famous author. Sarah Jane tells Ben that she wants to write a book about chalk figures on hill sides.

Later Sarah Jane visits Eddison Clough. Eddison Clough tells her that he can only completely recall his life since he moved back to Wolfenden. He lost a lot of memories and forgot everything from 1972 to 2004. All he knows about that time is from newspaper articles and photos. He doesn't even know if he had a wife or children and tells Sarah Jane he wouldn't even recognise them on photos. Sarah Jane also sees several photos of herself, Lavinia and Eddison, but she doesn't recognise the clothes, the location or anything else in the picture.

Then Sarah Jane meets up with Colin Hendrick, the head man of the village. He is charming and calm and answers Sarah Jane's questions about the White Wolf chalk figure as much as he can. He also invites Sarah Jane to a village meeting to get to know the other locals. Sarah Jane tells Colin that she has meet Eddison Clough. Colin Hendrick tells her that Eddison is not really all there and that he wouldn't recommend Sarah Jane to spend much time with Eddison.

Meanwhile, Rani Chandra and Clyde Langer decide to come to Wolfenden on their own to help Sarah Jane and Luke.

At the hostel Sarah Jane tells Luke to find out more about the Hendrick family. Luke also tells Sarah Jane that he believes that Ben is an alien. Luke then walks to the Hendrick's manor. When he arrives at the gates, Mrs Hendrick greets him. Luke says he is looking for Ben and Mrs Hendrick tells him that Ben is near the white wolf drawing. So Luke climbs up the hills in the direction of the drawing. Suddenly he hears a noise. He tries to find out what it is and starts falling, but is saved by Clyde.

Then Clyde and Luke investigate the hole, which is the at the eye of the white wolf drawing. They go inside trying to find the source of the noise. Since there is light in the tunnels Luke and Clyde know that there is someone in there. Soon Luke and Clyde find a hibernation system. Inside the system are creatures, who are at sleep waiting to be woken up. Suddenly Ben comes into the room with several other people. Luke tells Ben that he only needs the right chemicals so that the creatures in the hibernation system can wake up. However, Ben tells the other people to capture Luke and Clyde. Luke and Clyde try to run away but are found by Ben. Then Luke asks the people why the other aliens are kept in the hibernation system. The people tell him that they are aliens and are simply trying to go home. Every fifty years a ship from their home planet comes into range. They are trying to find the aliens since hundreds of years, but the aliens do not have any equipment powerful enough to contact them. That is why they stay in the hibernation state until the device can be reactivated. Now they want to try again. An alien showed the chemicals which they used to Luke. Luke says that these chemicals can only be found in humans. He realises that they are harvesting chemicals from people in the village, they get them from their brain. Now they want to drain Luke's memories to make sure that they can go home, but the machinery doesn't work on Luke. They try to steal Luke's memories but Luke accesses theirs instead.

In the meantime Sarah Jane goes to the village meeting. She talks about the white wolf and other chalk figures. Then Colin Hendrick and his wife arrive. Colin tells Sarah Jane that he would appreciate it if she would be truthful and that she hadn't been honest with them.

Suddenly Rani runs into the room and pretends that she has been abducted by aliens three years ago. Now she has escaped and needs their help. Roland Hendrick goes to Rani giving her a cup of tea. Rani says that her dad hates journalists and that they should crawl back into the caves they came from. She continues that her brother had mentioned that if someone puts all the newspaper and TV people into caves and seal them in it would cut of their power and that Clyde says the media is wrong. Sarah Jane realises that this is a secret message and that Mr Smith must have found out that the alien power is based under the caves of the white wolf. But not only Sarah Jane realises that this is a secret message the Hendricks realise this as well. They tell their guests to leave the house only Sarah Jane and Rani need to stay. Colin says that he knows now that Rani and Sarah Jane know each other. Sarah Jane asks where they come from. Colin tells her that he is from Manchester. Mrs Hendricks adds that she is from the Tristian Cluster and wants to go home. She also tells them about how they have harvested the chemicals from people's memories to find a way back home.

Suddenly Luke comes into the room, with the group of aliens, that Luke and Clyde had met at the caves. An alien says that Luke claims to be able to contact the mother ship and get them home. Luke adds that they could have gone home years ago, but that Mrs Hendrick chose not to. The aliens add that their machine could only read the memories of him but not take them. Through Luke's memories got to know that there are countless peaceful ways to go home. Luke adds that the chemicals only keeps the people in stasis, and that they don't power their transmitters which are broken and useless. Every fifty years Mrs Hendrick's species is looking for her but Mrs Hendrick makes sure that they can't find them. She was a prisoner. Her prison ship crashed on Earth. She has been doing this for centuries and has always got a new husband to help her to keep the rest of her original family in stasis. All the aliens in the room are Mrs Hendrick's children, all were born on Earth, all are half human half alien. They do not live much longer than a human.

Luke suggests to contact the mother ship. None of Mrs Hendrick's children is guilty of crimes on their home world and they can find a new home in this world. Then Sarah Jane tells Mr Smith to contact the mother ship. Mrs Hendrick is taken away in chains. All traces of alien technology get removed by aliens of her species. All of Mrs Hendrick's children go to the Tristian Cluster. Sarah Jane organises a meeting of all inhabitants of the village to tell them what exactly has happened and why they have lost their memories. Even though the people don't get their memories back, they at least know that it is all over now. An alien comes to the meeting and asks Sarah Jane if she is the representative of Earth. Sarah Jane says that she thinks that they both agree that it's the best if the Shadow Proclamation doesn't find out about this. The alien now talks to the people at the village. He says that they apologise for everything that has been done to the humans in Wolfenden. Then all aliens leave. Colin Hendrick is sitting alone in a chair feeling guilty and confused.

Eddison Clough decides that he wants to use his time on Earth to make new memories. Furthermore, he plans to support other people who lost their memories too. He also wants to pull the village back together and make it his new home.

Sarah Jane tells Eddison that she is glad that Eddison Clough had contacted her, because now she has a new picture of Lavinia.

Characters

 * Sarah Jane Smith
 * Luke Smith
 * Clyde Langer
 * Rani Chandra
 * Eddison Clough
 * Colin Hendrick
 * Ben Hendrick
 * Roland Hendrick
 * Mrs Hendrick
 * Andrea Coby

Worldbuilding

 * Mr Smith mentions that there are chalk figures of giant men near Wilmington and Cerne Abbas. He further mentions that Uffington and Cherhill are famous for their chalk drawings of white horses.
 * Mrs Pittman told Luke and Clyde's class a story about a Minotaur, Theseus and a labyrinth.
 * Eddison Clough is born in Rochdale in 1933.
 * After her aunt Lavinia Smith's death, Sarah Jane wrote an article about her for the Metropolitan.
 * Mrs Hendrick uses a hibernation system to put individuals of her species into a state of hibernation or sleep.

Continuity

 * Sarah Jane refers to Arcateenian poets, (TV: Invasion of the Bane) Pakhar academics, (PROSE: Legacy) and Sycorax slavers. (TV: The Christmas Invasion)
 * Through Luke's memories the alien find out about many peaceful ways to return home. They hear about that peaceful races had been on Earth and could have taken them home such as the Arcateenian, (TV: Invasion of the Bane) the Verron, (TV: Whatever Happened to Sarah Jane?) and even the Uvodni. (TV: Warriors of Kudlak)