The Tartarus Gate (audio story)

 was the twenty-ninth Bernice Summerfield audio story released by Big Finish Productions. It was the first story of the seventh season.

Publisher's summary
Benny is missing, having not returned from a dig. Kidnapped expertly. Removed from time and space completely. Jason, of course, uses every means at his disposal to find her. But resources are limited: the Braxiatel Collection has its own far more urgent problems.

Then he receives information on her possible whereabouts, from a benevolent religious order known as the CroSSScape.

Why is Benny on the planet Cerebus Iera, a planet on the cliff-edge of the universe? A planet that is known to be violent, dangerous, and uninhabitable. A planet rumoured to have links to the Tartarus Gate, the mythical gateway to hell.

Plot
Benny has gone missing and Jason remains at the Braxiatel Collection, looking after Peter and being responsible for the weather system, whilst his friends and a team put together by Bev and Adrian look for her. Joseph introduces Jason to a member of the CroSSScape, a gestalt which reverts planets on the verge of extinction to an earlier point and has found Benny's diary beneath the surface of Cerebus Iera. The CroSSScape transfer Jason to the planet and take him to engineer La^Heyne.

La^Heyne drugs Jason and reveals that she and the CroSSScape have kidnapped Benny. They use him to force Benny to allow herself to be experimented on whilst the same is done to Jason, but he is more responsive due to his time in other universes and confirms that the Tartarus Gate is on Cerebus Iera. When the native Soldiers attack, La^Heyne gets Jason to safety and Benny is freed by NI/cian 137, an agent to whom she explains that the Tartarus Gate supposedly leads to hell and that CroSSScape seem to believe that their god is trapped there. The CroSSScape want their god to inhabit Benny's body, as she has had a god in her head before, and open or remove a physical box which has appeared in their datascape.

Benny and 137 discover that the box has been draining energy from the datascape and that the CroSSScape have been replacing it with energy from the worlds they have restored. The two of them are transported into the datascape and surrender, with 137 being taken away and Benny learns that the CroSSScape no longer have Jason. Her biochemistry is being rewritten so that the god will know to inhabit her and her mind, stored in the datascape, will be sent to hell in exchange. With her mind in the datascape, her body is controlled by the CroSSScape.

La^Heyne employs Jason's help to keep the CroSSScape from opening the Gate, which they find is actually a black hole, and she reveals that the factory that the CroSSScape use to restore planets has been downloading itself into her for years with the aim of absorbing the god and erasing the CroSSScape from the datascape. The CroSSScape arrive with Benny and find that 137 escaped the datascape with the help of a portion of Ship which has schismed due to its existence in physical scape. Ship is now on a collision course with the factory which is required to open the Gate and the Soldiers throw the CroSSScape into the Gate, but they return in a new body and subdue the Soldiers.

Ship hits and destroys the factory, removing its control over the Gate. It opens and the CroSSScape's god possesses Benny, warning of the demons that will follow. Jason allows himself to be taken to hell in Benny's place and La^Heyne, now containing the entirety of the factory, saves him and takes the god, telling the CroSSScape that she was the one who placed the box in the datascape so that they would search out their god. The CroSSScape transfer everybody to the datascape and order La^Heyne to hand over the god, but Jason demands that the god enters him instead and he erases the CroSSScape. La^Heyne restores Benny and shuts the Gate and places the god inside the box.

Jason accepts La^Heyne's offer of the return of the memories that he has lost, wanting to know everything that Braxiatel made him forget and learning of something squirming inside Braxiatel's head. She tells him and Benny that there is "conflict and strangeness" in the future and that something is coming for the Collection, which she is interested in from what she learnt from Jason's mind. Whatever is coming, Jason says, they are on their own as they can never trust Braxiatel again.

Cast

 * Bernice Summerfield - Lisa Bowerman
 * Jason Kane - Stephen Fewell
 * Joseph - Steven Wickham
 * CroSSScape - Neville Watchurst
 * La^Heyne - Julia Righton
 * NI/cian 137 - Crispin Shingler

Crew

 * Cover Art - Adrian Salmon
 * Director - John Ainsworth
 * Executive Producer - Jason Haigh-Ellery
 * Music and Sound Designer - David Darlington
 * Producer - Simon Guerrier
 * Writer - Stewart Sheargold

Continuity

 * Jason recalls what Braxiatel did to his mind. (AUDIO: The Crystal of Cantus) He also realises that there is some evil from Brax's past in Brax's mind. (AUDIO: Pandora)
 * Benny mentions that her childhood doll Rebecca had appeared as part of her torture. (PROSE: Love and War, Return of the Living Dad)