The Emporium at the End (audio story)

The Emporium at the End was the fourth and final story in The New Adventures of Bernice Summerfield box set The Unbound Universe.

Publisher's summary
The Last Song has been sung, and the final days of the universe have begun. Everyone flees to the gateway – to find that The Emporium At The End is having a closing down sale.

Plot
The TARDIS receives a distress call from the Sisterhood of St Beedlix and the Cloister Bell rings, signifying that the end of the universe is nigh. Benny and the Doctor, who believes that it is too early for the universe to end, meet with the Mother Superior in a refugee camp and learn that the Eye of Beedlix and other stars have gone out.

The Doctor invites all of the refugees into the TARDIS and they join the queue to the Gateway Emporium before the Manager, whose voice the Doctor recognises, allows them to join the priority lane. The Manager welcomes them and invites Benny to have a look around, giving her a wink. She learns that memories can be used as currency and stops Forz from selling his to buy lottery tickets with the chance of going through the Gateway to another universe; instead, she tries and fails to steal dark matter rings to pay for them.

The Manager tells the Doctor that he once sold him something useful long ago and has his guards throw him outside where he meets people who have traded their memories away. Forz soon joins them, no longer remembering ever having a daughter, but with only an hour until the universe ends the Manager has the doors reopened. Lottery tickets are now heavily discounted and the Doctor offers to sell his memories to buy some for everybody. However, the machine claims that he has no memories to sell.

The Manager visits Benny in her cell and invites her to his private suite for champagne. He explains that he cannot let everybody through the Gateway due to more power being required each time somebody passes through. They nearly kiss before the Mother Superior interrupts them and gives the Manager a bottle of wine as thanks for his role in the Great War. He offers to send Benny through the Gateway and return to her universe in order to widen the portal and allow more people to pass through.

The Doctor starts a rebellion and questions whether the Gateway really is a way out. The Manager is called and announces that the portal is now open to all. Everybody rushes out of the Emporium and the Manager makes an announcement asking Benny to join them, which she does with the Doctor after giving him a sonic screwdriver. Before she can pass through the portal, the Doctor uses the screwdriver to temporarily shut it down and reveals that he stabilised the universe with his memories when he and the Manager built the Gateway. Additionally, the reason he abandoned the Manager during the war was because of his plan to use a forbidden weapon.

Benny has the Doctor throw her the screwdriver and discovers that the Gateway atomises those who pass through it. The Manager, she deduces, is planning on using the resulting energy and her as an anchor to get himself to safety. The Manager denies this, but refuses to step through the portal when the Mother Superior suggests it and Sister Christie, Sister Perpetua and Sister Agnes throw him in. The Doctor confirms that the universe is not actually ending and that the Manager made the stars appear to go out using smoke and mirrors.

Benny reunites Forz with his daughter and he begins to remember her. She and the Doctor return to the TARDIS, which he believes he might be able to repair using some of the Manager's technology. He promises to get Benny back home to her family one day.

Cast

 * Bernice Summerfield - Lisa Bowerman
 * The Doctor - David Warner
 * Sister Christie - Lizzie Hopley
 * Ampz - Shvorne Marks
 * Forz - Gus Brown
 * Elevator - Scott Handcock
 * Mother Superior - Rowena Cooper
 * The Master - Sam Kisgart

The Master

 * The Unbound Master is using the title "The Manager" as an alias.
 * According to the Master, he and the Doctor both worked together to build the Emporium. When the Great War hit, the Doctor ran away. The Doctor does not recall it, but accepts that it could be a possibility due to his recent memory loss.

Technology

 * Bernice finds a sonic screwdriver and states that "her" Doctor would recognise it. She also notes that she doesn't recognise this particular model.
 * The Sisterhood of Beedlix have an astrometric scanner.
 * Bernice has met cyborg kids before in her universe. She once performed a C-section on armoured battle borg twins with a battlefield laser.

The Emporium

 * Poorer customers are able to sell their memories to buy items if they do not have enough credits.
 * As Bernice finds out first hand, the gateway does not actually lead to another universe. In fact, it atomises anyone who walks into it.

Unbound Universe

 * The Eye of Beedlix is the Sisters' sacred star.
 * Due to the Master's use of "smoke and mirrors", as the Doctor refers to it, stars and galaxies are missing. The Master has made it seem to customers as though it's the end of the universe.
 * The Doctor sells his memories to expand the lifespan of the universe by a few thousand years.

The TARDIS

 * The TARDIS is still finding it difficult to travel far in time and space. At any one time, she is limited to the number of planets she can reach due to the power it takes to get there. Travelling becomes strained for her.
 * The Cloister bell rings.
 * The TARDIS has trouble handling so many people when they travel to the Emporium.

Beverages

 * The Mother Superior and her nuns continue to refresh and calm themselves with tea.
 * The Mother Superior gives bottles of holy wine to 'the Manager' and Benny during their meeting but refuses to drink it herself at first.
 * Later, the Mother Superior and Benny get themselves drunk on wine.

Continuity

 * The Doctor does not remember the Unbound Master's face from their previous meeting in Hong Kong on 30 June 1997. (AUDIO: Sympathy for the Devil), since he has given up these memories.
 * Bernice Summerfield procures a sonic screwdriver, saying that "her" Doctor would know what it is. (TV: Fury from the Deep et al)
 * The Doctor continues to refer to himself as the King and President of the Universe. (AUDIO: Sympathy for the Devil)
 * Upon hearing the Doctor's identity, most people recognise him, but do not show him any form of affection. (AUDIO: The Library in the Body)
 * The Doctor and Benny once again meet the Mother Superior and her nuns. (AUDIO: The Library in the Body)