Bad Faith (audio story)

Bad Faith was the second story in Vienna: Series One, produced by Big Finish Productions. It was written by Nev Fountain and featured Chase Masterson as Vienna Salvatori.

Publisher's summary
Vienna Salvatori has seen the light.

Time was, if you lost everything, at least you still had your faith – but not any more. Faith stealing is the latest commodity to light up the criminal underworld – extract somebody’s faith and sell it to the highest bidder.

On the trail of a faith stealing ring, Vienna Salvatori comes into the orbit of the charismatic Bax Spendlove, spiritual leader of the Church of New Wonderment, a breakaway sect of the Church of Old Wonderment. Bax has an important mission for his latest convert – and Vienna is a willing disciple.

But when Bax’s followers start to be murdered, it seems Vienna isn’t the only killer keeping the faith&hellip;

Plot
A Kreyfin approaches and asks a Sargeant Lane for the whereabouts of a 'vertibrate'. Lane informs it that they cornered the assassin on the north passage of the Karnon Rocks, and that she is believed to be wounded. The Kreyfin congratulates Lane on his successful work. The Kreyfin orders him to locate the assassin and keep her found entering the compound. Lane turns to his soldier and orders them back to base. The female soldier asks him to lead the way as she is feeling lost on Karnos Delta. Lane understands, stating that Karnos Delta is 'mountains and crators as far as the eye can see'.

Lane informs his soldier that the assassin's mission is to infiltrate the compound and shut down all Kreyfin operations. He orders three soldiers, over the comms, to enter a defensive position around the compound as the assassin is on her way. His soldiers do not respond. Thinking aloud, the soldier suggests the idea that the assassin killed the three soldiers, infiltrated her way into the ranks and kept Lane alive just to find out whether or not the whole operation was a trap. Getting a little uneasy, Lane asks her why he can't remember her name. She points out that that's due to her not having time to program an alias into the hypno leech attached to his neck. She informs him that her name is Vienna Salvatori. She then shoots him dead.

Approaching the compound, a Kreyfin soldier asks her to place her right hand on an activation panel. Vienna uses the hand of Lane to open the door, and walks inside. Meanwhile one Kreyfin is getting very panicky about Vienna's whereabouts. Another calms him. A caged man named Mylo, from the Society of Euphoric Happiness, offers Vienna his very limited help. Vienna realises that she is in the middle of a faith stealing operation. She explains to Mylo that his very faith and that of all the other prisoners is being stolen from them and sold off to the rich. A Kreyfin warns Vienna to leave over the intercom but true Vienna style, she warns them that she's coming for them.

Vienna blasts through the door and demands the name of the person who is running the operation from the Kreyfin inside. To her surprise, the two Kreyfin inside simply explode all over her. Back at her ship, she asks her computer to analyse the Kreyfin residue that she accumulated. The computer explains that due to the compound being several thousand feet above sea level, her act of opening the door depressurised the room and caused them to explode, thus making their deaths her own fault. This confuses Vienna, who points out that someone practically has done her job for her and has then paid her for it.

Vienna visits the New Church of Wonderment where she is welcomed by Miss Lilitrick. Vienna states that she wishes to report a miracle. She states that despite having just killed people on Karnos Delta, she was suddenly filled with love for the New Church of Wonderment and the 'devine Arno Goodfellow', despite never having thought about him before. She remembers being back on the ship and praying to Arno Goodfellow to protect those upon Karnos Delta. The computer then interrupts her prayer to suggest that her new faith may be an infection, to which Vienna responds in a very prickly manner. When the computer demands a brain scan to check for infection, Vienna forces an update in line with her new beliefs. Vienna then watches her new hologram message by a Bax Spendlove, who invites her to Ironimus Six so that he can tell her what Arlo has planned for her.

After finishing her explanation to Lilitrick, Lilitrick refuses her an audience with Bax Spendlove. Impatient, Vienna shows Lilitrick the true miracle - the stigmata of Arno Goodfellow, the founder of the New Church of Wonderment. This forces Lilitrick to offer her an upgrade to a Grade 1 Miracle. Bax then rings Lilitrick and asks that Vienna bypasses the examination process and simply enters her meeting with Bax. Finally meeting with Bax and verifying the stigmata, Vienna reveals to him her name and previous occupation. He then rings up Kendra Spendlove, his wife, and asks her to join them. When Kendra enters, Bax explains that Kendra was once a member of the Old Church of Wonderment before meeting Bax and seeing the 'true path'. Kendra explains that despite the current seperation of churches, that both churches would be stronger as one. Bax explains that Kendra is venturing to the Phantom Deserts of Osuri to meet with Parsival, the head of the Old Church. Bax asks Vienna to use her skillset wisely and accompany his wife on her journey, much to Kendra's dismay. Kendra states that 'Mr. Clancy', their inter-faith adviser, wouldn't allow it.

As Bax and Kendra argue over the issue, they soon learn that Mr. Clancy has been stabbed to death with a grudge knife, which enters the body, deposits micro-drones into the veins that detonate when they hit a vital organ. On the wall, in Clancy's blood, is written a message. Vienna explains that you can program the blood spatter to form a very specific pattern. In this case, it is a message reading: 'The Old Church will destroy all from within'. Bax seems to think that it is part of Parsival's scheme to destroy the New Church from the inside. Bax stubbornly states that due to Vienna having acquired more knowledge on the murders than the police have ever managed, that she will join Kendra on her mission to find the truth. Vienna decides to ask Lilitrick how long she knew that Clancy was dead. She notes that despite using the intercom to attempt to contact Clancy, she didn't give him enough time to respond before checking up on him. When Lilitrick protests her innocence, she suggests that perhaps she could take a memory scan. With the memory scan, she notes Lilitrick walking in on Clancy being brutally murdered by a nine foot demon in armour, riding a horse. She explains that she is wearing miracle lenses, which reinterpret everything the wearer sees back as a miracle whilst also filtering out things that may cause the wearer to question their beliefs. Due to the lenses being forbidden, Bax scolds her and sends her to the confessional booth to reflect upon her actions. Bax then asks Vienna to remove Parsival from his position, thus turning people to the New Church, to which she agrees.

Within the confessional booth, Lilitrick Raliaminopololis is interrupted by an unknown person who proceeds to murder her. Whilst aboard Vienna's ship awaiting disembarkation, Kendra relays Vienna's idea about surveying Clancy's last memories to see if it gives them any clues as to his murderer. Bax plays the death confession, which plays to only Bax's ears, that Clancy not only had unjust thoughts about coveting Kendra, but also openly admits to conspiring with Bax and being a faith stealer and then selling it to the wealthy, in order to raise the profile of the religion. Bax then goes ahead and deletes all information that would incriminate him, before reopening coms and giving the all clear to Kendra. Bax then reveals that he plans to ride along with them, and reassures Kendra that he will not be joining them on their mission.

The ship prepares their journey to Osuriary City. At that point, Bax enters and reveals the murder of Lilitrick, also revealing the same messaging in her blood pattern. After their journey, they land at the Phantom Dunes at the City. There, they locate the Chidnos, a wild beast used for transporation, purchase two and begin to ride. Kendra explains that when she and Bax met, he was so desperate to be with her that within a few days, the stigmata mysteriously appeared on her arm. She states that she and Vienna are not so different - they both once awoke with the stigmata and suddenly 'understood' life.

The two of them finally arrive at the ancient tunnels, where Kendra stops Vienna from shooting the former soldier robot, who know is programmed to guard the tunnels. Kendra asks the robot to relay her request for an audience with the church, which the robot takes its time to process. Kendra explains that such a request could take over a week, much to the shock of Vienna. Within a minute, and to their surprise, their audience is granted. Within the tunnels, the two of them are attempting to keep up with the robot. They finally make their way into the hall where Kendra orders Vienna to not observe Parsival, who Vienna notes is roughly fifty feet tall.

Kendra introduces Parsival to the berobed Vienna. Before her eyes, the robed figure drops to the floor to reveal a dead Monk with a leech attached to his neck. Elsewhere, Vienna is following the sound of crying. Upon seeing the person doing the crying she recognises him as Persival Kendric. Kendric is frantically telling Vienna that everything is a lie and orders her to kill him. At that moment, Kendra rushes in and orders her to move away. Vienna is not impressed by this display and reveals that she's already worked out that Kendric is the real head of the Old Church and that Parsival was nothing more than a hologram. She remembers that Persival Kendric was a mere gourmet chef and once-boyfriend of Kendra's on Divos. Vienna summises that Kendra's missions back and forth to the old church was to care for her former-boyfriend. It's at this moment that Vienna gets down to business and reveals that her real mission was to kill Kendric under orders from Bax, much to the shock of Kendra.

Kendra refuses to believe that anyone of Kendric's capabilities could ever pull off such a complex muderous scheme and rushes in front of him, telling Vienna to go through her to reach Kendric. At that moment, in the freezing cold room, Kendra complains at the sudden rise in temperature. She bursts into light. The robots use this heat signature to locate Vienna and other humans so that they can harvest their faith. Vienna awakens and finds Bax having clamped her securely in her ship. Bax has set the ship to return to Ironimus Six. Bax admits that he slipped her a thermal explosive in her wine before take-off. Bax reveals that not only has he lied to Vienna, but Vienna has been also lying to him.

The stigmata on her arm was fake and she was only using it to inveigle her way into the Church, much to the disappointment of Bax. Vienna reveals that she knew Bax was playing a long game that went as far back to her meeting with Lane on Karnos Delta. She had used a scan to reveal that Lane had been heavily dosed with 'faith' by the New Church as part of an entrapment to get Vienna to Bax. Vienna allowed herself to become a willing participant in this trap, even pretending to have found faith. She goes onto state that getting her to simply join a church didn't require such extraordinary means and this had made her suspicious, thus starting her investigation.

Vienna asks Bax to play his ex-wife's final confession and he does so. Kendra explains, through her confession, that during her time at the New Church, she had been conversing with Parsival/Kendric at the Old Church. Kendric had also dreamt of the unification of the churches and so, Kendric had made the ultimate sacrifice. Kendric had allowed Kendra to take his faith of the Old Church and inject it into Bax while he was sleeping, thus allowing both belief systems to live within Bax, and thus successfully unifying the Church. Because of Kendric's influence and conspiring on Bax, this lead Bax to send Vienna, an expert assassin, on a mission that would provide her the means of taking down Bax's illegal faith stealing operation.

Bax suddenly goes split-personality. Vienna explains to him that he'd been committing the murders in his own Church for months without even knowing. Bax and Kendric are both surprised when who they assume to be Arlo Goodfellow speaks to them about his anger towards their actions. Vienna tries to get them to see that it isn't Arlo. She explains that she's used Lilitrick's rose-tinted contact lenses on them, hence the hallucination of Arlo. Arlo then transforms into the real figure of Kendra Spendlove, who is very much alive. Vienna explains that she has been using the sunglasses to feed him false information. Vienna had located and removed the thermal explosive long before they began their mission, and that the rest was just play-acting. They both explain to him that miracle lenses did the rest of the work, only showing Bax what he wanted to see, including Kendra's supposed explosion.

Kendra opens up a livefeed and shows him what's truly happening - the slaughter of the Kreyfin and the demolition of the Old Church. Kendric takes over Bax's body and activates the airlock of the ship. Vienna and Kendra hold onto the ship while Kendric sacrifices himself/themselves. Vienna notes that Kendra managed to unite the Churches with the death of Bax and Kendric. Returning to the sacred tunnels, they visit Kendric's former body. Kendra, the new Pastor of the new Church, is unsure of what to do with him. Vienna suggests injecting him with one of Bax's many faiths. Kendra downright refuses, stating it unjust to cure him with someone else's loss.

On her ship, Vienna has used pieces of her own life to create her own synthetic religion, the Cult of Saint Viola Raven. With Kendra's permission, she injects the new religion into Kendric, who recognises Vienna as St. Viola. When Vienna tries to explain herself away as a vision, he states that he can help her. He states he knows the whereabouts of Crevo Finn. Kendric explains that long before working at the Church, he worked at the imperial kitchens on Kazbar. She takes this new knowledge on board and refuses his help, giving him a false mission to spread her equally false faith. She explains to Kendra that she will bring others in a few weeks' time, one of whom is Mylo, to act as his disciples.

Vienna reflects on her little rule and decides that Kendra can be spared a death. She then asks the computer to return its computing system to the previous one.

Cast

 * Vienna Salvatori - Chase Masterson
 * Bax Spendlove - Frazer Hines
 * Kendra Spendlove - Rachel Atkins
 * Kreyfin - Mike Grady
 * Sargeant Lane - ?
 * Mylo - ?
 * Lilitrick Raliaminopololis - ?
 * Daryl Clancy - ?

''Please leave this list uncompleted. I will research in my freetime and fix it.''

Food and beverage

 * Vienna, posing as a soldier, notes that the inside of her helmet smells like sushi.

People

 * Kendra Spendlove is an inter-faith director for the New Church of Wonderment.
 * Taz Becker is a holovid star.
 * Winona Flack is a warpsled champion.

Religion

 * Arno Goodfellow, the founder of the New Church of Wonderment, nailed himself by his right hand to the steeple of the Church of Wonderment so that the soldiers could not reach him. He hung there for seven days and seven nights. Once the soldiers burnt down the church, Goodfellow died. The mark from his right hand, known as the stigmata, will only appear on the chosen. Vienna received such a mark.
 * The New Church of Wonderment split from the Old Church of Wonderment roughly eight centuries ago due to differing interpretations.
 * The Old Church pray for the departed from the faith and joined another religion.
 * Vienna remarks on the lifelike wall carvings in one of the chambers of the Old Church. Kendra points out that they are real monks who have taken a vow of motionlessness to pray for Parsival. Only on death do any of them move.

Species

 * The Kreyfin are referred to as the 'Lobster Mobsters'.
 * Lane informs Vienna that it is against his religion to serve the Kreyfin.
 * Vienna uses a hypno leech to make Lane believe her credentials as a soldier.
 * Vienna states that Mylo is being milked like a Three Horned Quench.
 * The Chidnos are a spiky, wild beast used for transportation. According to Kendra, the end that doesn't make the noise is the beast's head.

Technology

 * The soldiers use Beta 3s to communicate with one-another.
 * Kendra Spendlove has appeared in 'docuvertisements' and is known to Vienna.
 * Mr. Clancy is murdered with a grudge knife.
 * Lilitrick is wearing miracle lenses.

Continuity

 * Vienna states that her assignment crystal "got it all wrong". (AUDIO: The Memory Box et al)
 * Vienna sticks to her main rule and is forced to shoot Lane dead when he learns her name. (AUDIO: The Memory Box et al)
 * Unexpectedly, Vienna breaks this rule and makes an exception for Kendra, stating that she's already died once.


 * When Lilitrick protests her innocence regarding the murder of Mr. Clancy, Vienna suggests that perhaps she should take a memory scan. (AUDIO: The Memory Box et al)
 * Bax uses a thermal explosive to murder Kendra. Vienna threatened to do the same to Norvelle if he didn't do as he was told. It was also used by Vienna as part of her endgame strategy in the same adventure. (AUDIO: The Memory Box)