Virgin Lands (short story)

Summary
The Doctor takes Ace and Benny to an old colonial mansion in Sydney, Australia to visit a woman named LaMort. Ace is hoping for a confrontation; a gunman recently ran amok in Port Arthur, the second such massacre in a month’s time, and Ace wants to believe that an alien monster is responsible. Ace waits and then follows the Doctor in through the front door, while Benny sneaks into the house around the back -- and while Ace sees herself in an opulent house full of party guests, Benny has fought her way through an overgrown backyard jungle into an abandoned, decaying ruin. Upstairs, the Doctor is talking to a woman whom only he and Ace can see, but whom Benny can hear. Her face looks like skin stretched over a skull and her voice sounds like decay; she is LaMort, Death, and she’s weary of her role, having seen everything on Earth there is to see. The Doctor knows that death still has a vital part to play, and has Benny tell LaMort about her life. Death realises that the human race is bound to leave Earth and expand out into the cosmos, taking her influence to new worlds previously untouched; there will always be more for her to see. Ace can’t accept the finality of death, but accepts that the human race is responsible for its own crimes.

Characters
Seventh Doctor

Ace

Benny

Continuity
to be added