Private Enemy No. 1 (audio story)

Private Enemy No. 1 was the fifty-fifth Bernice Summerfield audio story released by Big Finish Productions. It was the third story of the Epoch series.

Publisher's summary
"The Great Leader is dead... Long live the Great Leader!"

Atlantis is in disarray. The Historians are hiding Bernice, Leonidas and Ruth within their safe house – but the world is changing more than they could have ever imagined.

People are being erased from existence, their memories wiped clean and replaced with those of others. Entire buildings are altering, times are changing... and the Hierophants are on the move.

Can Bernice and her friends save Atlantis from the end of existence? Or will they too be assimilated?

Plot
With the Great Leader destroyed, the Temple of Poseidon is left empty and his followers are in chaos. Helena is discussing the situation with her father, Craisus, when she suffers a seizure and becomes Gaudium of the Hierophant; Craisus forgets that she was once his daughter and recognises her as a Hierophant, offering her his apologies.

With the authorities looking for her since the Great Leader's destruction, Benny is in a Historian safe house for her own safety and Leo goes out to try to put together a fish finger sandwich for her and learns of the Hierophants. He realises that he is being followed by Gaudium and warns Cordin, a fellow Historian who is accosted by her and ordered to give Benny's location to the Epoch; when he pleads ignorance, he has a seizure and becomes a Hierophant called Macabre whilst retaining Cordin's memories.

Darion, a big fan of Benny's, visits her and tells her that people who remember before Year Zero have started speaking out and the Historians are petitioning to allow her to speak at the Senate. When Leonidas returns, he finds that Darion remembers the Hierophants being around for years and a group of them, led by Macabre, approach the building. Benny and Ruth escape onto the rooftops and are chased by a Mars Police Helicar as they head to the Temple of Hermes, which has somehow been replaced with a 27th century Transuniversal Export call centre. They are forced to surrender and the Hierophants order Benny to speak at the Senate.

Using Leo's diamond ring, Benny, Ruth and Leo cut their way into the call centre. Benny decides to try sending out a message and gets a call from Jack, who tells her to hurry to the spire and that he is the only person other than her who remembers when Atlantis was Zordin. Darion joins them and Benny has him look at a map of the city to point out inaccuracies with the city as he now remembers it; he notices at least fifteen errors, including the location of the Senate, and urges them to leave before curfew, which he remembers being introduced by the King four years ago. After the building loses power, they return to the safe house.

At dinner, Leo kisses Benny, but she takes a moment to express her concerns for his safety and to make sure that they were not kissing for the wrong reasons. She kisses him and they have sex. In the morning, Leo goes to the Senate without Benny, whom he drugged to keep her asleep. By the time Benny and Ruth arrive at the Senate, now known as the House of Representatives, the Epoch have turned Leo and the other Historians into Hierophants. New buildings keep appearing around the city and Benny and Ruth head back to the call centre in the hopes of rebooting the Great Leader, who had never caused such destruction, but it has disappeared and been replaced with a spire.

Benny and Ruth find an empty room at the top of the spire and see that nothing, the substance between matter and antimatter, is surrounding the city. Leo, now called Traulus, joins them and speaks on behalf of the Epoch; he asks her to become their sole and unquestioning Hierophant, in return for which the world will return to however she likes it and Leo and Acanthus will be restored. She can tell from his body language that he is lying and that the Epoch cannot stop the nothing, so she and Ruth wait for the end whilst Traulus disappears. They sing "the sky's no limit".

Cast

 * Bernice Summerfield - Lisa Bowerman
 * Ruth - Ayesha Antoine
 * Leonidas - Marcus Hutton
 * Craisus - Prentis Hancock
 * Darion - Chris Johnson
 * Helena - Rebecca Newman
 * Cordin - Graeme Henderson
 * Jack - David Ames
 * The Epoch - Michael Thomson
 * Heskith - John Montgomery

Worldbuilding

 * Leo decides to make fish finger sandwiches for Benny.
 * Darion says that Benny is like his mother, "but hotter".
 * Cordin is a student.
 * Darion says that Macabre's father was a Hierophant.
 * The Hierophants have barcodes on their foreheads, which Benny thinks is to make people believe that the Great Leader survived.
 * Ruth mentions the Temple of Hermes, to which Darion once belonged. It is transformed into a Transuniversal Export building.
 * Benny and Ruth run from a mid-23rd century Mars Police Helicar.
 * Benny and Leo steal a map from the library.
 * The House of Representatives is replaced by an open-air amphitheatre and moved to the location of a market.
 * Darion remembers the King introducing a curfew.
 * Benny describes her life as "War and Peace complicated".
 * Benny mentions Peter, Adrian, Bev and Braxiatel.
 * Benny and Jason once had to save the universe with a car battery, a copy of The Beano and a potato.

Continuity

 * The Great Leader has been destroyed. (AUDIO: The Temple of Questions)
 * A man offers two-for-one blessings at the temple of Amdo. (TV: The Underwater Menace)
 * Helena mentions the Bronze Palace where the Queen wept for her beloved, but Craisus has no memory of it. Benny later mentions the Queen and her palace as well. (AUDIO: The Kraken's Lament)
 * Darion and Benny both mention Pallis. (AUDIO: Year Zero)
 * Benny mentions how Acanthus disappeared. (AUDIO: The Kraken's Lament, The Temple of Questions)
 * Benny recalls the Pillars of Hercules, the Kraken and pegasi. (AUDIO: The Kraken's Lament)
 * Benny vaguely remembers somebody mentioning the Epoch. (AUDIO: The Temple of Questions)
 * Benny uses Leo's diamond ring again. (AUDIO: The Temple of Question)
 * Benny has forgotten Jack once again. (AUDIO: The Kraken's Lament, The Temple of Questions)
 * Jack remembers when Atlantis was Zordin. (AUDIO: Year Zero, Dead Man's Switch)
 * Benny mentions being dumped by a lover and being left with his cat. (PROSE: The Dying Days)
 * Benny mentions the death of Jason Kane. (AUDIO: The End of the World)
 * Leo mentions Charis. (AUDIO: The Temple of Questions)
 * Leo asks what happened to Wolsey. (PROSE: Inappropriate Laughter)
 * Benny tells Leo not to turn into another Irving Braxiatel. (AUDIO: Professor Bernice Summerfield and the Mirror Effect, etc.)
 * Benny has encountered nothing before. (AUDIO: Dead Man's Switch)
 * Benny mentions Otek. (AUDIO: Dead Man's Switch)
 * Benny remembers Gormune from Raster, who told her that she was toxic and had to be removed. (AUDIO: Year Zero)