Professor Bernice Summerfield and the Dance of the Dead (audio story)

Professor Bernice Summerfield and the Dance of the Dead, or simply The Dance of the Dead, was the fourteenth Bernice Summerfield audio story produced by Big Finish Productions. It was the first Bernice Summerfield audio story to feature the Ice Warriors and only the second time they've appeared on audio. The first was in the 2000 Doctor Who audio story Red Dawn.

This story leads on from The Plague Herds of Excelis with Iris Wildthyme having dropped Benny on board the Empress following their adventure.

Publisher's summary
Illegally smuggled aboard a spaceship, hungover to the nth degree, all Benny Summerfield wants is to curl up in a ball and die. And it looks like she's going to get her chance.

When disaster strikes the ship — human error, or deliberate sabotage? — Benny barely survives. Banding together with a party of Ice Warriors and a laconic steward, a hazardous, arduous race is on to find a way out of the wreck before it breaks up all together. But are her fellow escapees all they seem? Benny finds that's hard to tell when your own mind's being hijacked by the memories and emotions of a dead alien — while a Martian Grand Marshall becomes your better half...

Plot
After being dropped off on the Empress by Iris to complete her journey back to the Braxiatel Collection, Benny meets the steward Karter, Grand Marshal Sstac of New Mars and his aide-de-camp General Azzar. Above Ronnos Minor, Karter warns of a belt of turbulence and a generator explodes, apparently splitting open several Kolgarian crystals and releasing a gas which kills the Kolgarians.

Azzar finds that the hull has been torn apart and a number of people sucked out into space. Whilst Benny and Sstac wait behind due to their lack of equipment to help them breathe, Azzar and Karter head to the bridge to extinguish the flames and increase the oxygen and Azzar comes to believe that a bomb was responsible for the damage. Sstac calls Benny "Musjarna", a name that he does not recognise, and Benny accuses him of leaving her in the rain before coming to her senses. The sprinklers are activated and Benny and Sstac make the journey to the bridge, during which Sstac realises that they absorbed memories from the crystals.

to be completed

Cast

 * Professor Bernice Summerfield - Lisa Bowerman
 * Grand Marshall Sstac - Matthew Brenher
 * Karter - Francis Magee
 * General Azzar - Vivien Parry

Continuity

 * Iris Wildthyme placed Benny on the starship after their adventure on Excelis. (AUDIO: The Plague Herds of Excelis)
 * Before leaving, Iris states that she was going to a bar that she knew, leading into her adventure with the Sixth Doctor. (AUDIO: The Wormery)