Ghost Walk (audio story)

Ghost Walk was the two hundred and thirty-fifth story in Big Finish's monthly range. It was written by James Goss and featured Peter Davison as the Fifth Doctor, Matthew Waterhouse as Adric, Sarah Sutton as Nyssa and Janet Fielding as Tegan Jovanka.

Publisher's summary
This is a city of ghosts and no-one knows them better than Leanne. Twice a night she leads tourists to visit the most haunted sites - the Hanging Yard, the Witch Pool, the Screaming House, and, of course, the Catacombs.

Leanne's realised the ghosts of the city are real. Something's lurking in the Catacombs - an ancient force that has been growing in the darkness for centuries. Sabaoth is returning and they must be stopped before they devour the world. Leanne knows this, because a ghost told her.

A ghost called The Doctor.

Part one
''Whilst Leanne is giving a ghost tour at the catacombs in Yorkshire, a man runs to an altar in a forbidden room and declares that the hungry Sabaoth is coming and needs Leanne. She hears the voice of the Doctor in her mind, apologising for the theatrics and asking if she believes in ghosts.''

The Doctor answers a distress call and pilots the TARDIS to the catacombs in the 17th century instead of aiming for Heathrow. The travellers split up and Nyssa senses something which attacks Adric and pushes into her mind to make her feel afraid and hungry. After leaving a room with markings written in chicken blood and bones drained of energy, the Doctor and Tegan find Adric and Nyssa shivering on the floor and get them back to the TARDIS, but the ship is dead and the Doctor instead uses an emergency temporal shift to send his companions to safety. Tegan, however, chooses to stay and help.

''Leanne now understands how the Doctor ended up being stuck in the catacombs and that all of the talk of hauntings over the centuries have indeed been real. She does not know how he got out, however, and he answers that he did not. He says that he died in the catacombs.''

Part two
Having appeared in 1738, Nyssa is rescued from being burnt as a witch by Matthew Doyle and taken to his vicarage where she tells him about time travel and learns that the catacombs are currently owned by the reclusive Brotherhood of Sabaoth. Matthew visits them to find her friends and is kept waiting in the cold for hours, after which he kisses Nyssa and is rejected when he offers her a quiet life with him. Mrs Stubbs spreads the rumour that Matthew has been bewitched by Nyssa and, heartbroken and kept from his church, he stops defending her and she is to be drowned, watched by the Brotherhood.

The Doctor is without a plan and realises from Tegan's lethargy that she is being fed on by the alien. To keep her awake, he makes her walk with him around the catacombs.

Adric confesses in court to stealing a loaf of bread and is imprisoned pending execution. The cloaked Brotherhood attend his execution, drawn by the temporal energy around him and intending to feed it to Sabaoth, and he ensures that his name is mentioned in the newspaper. A noose is placed around Adric's neck and, despite his request for a few minutes more in the hopes that the Doctor might save him at the last minute, the floor beneath him drops as the crowd cheers.

Part three
Leanne in the present explains that a boy named Derrick was hung from the gallows but mysteriously disappeared during the hanging and takes out a newspaper article and picture to show it, which the Doctor, in Leanne's head, tries to get her to give him a good look. They get into an argument and she tries to ignore him. He tries to convince her to explore the catacombs she gave a tour at earlier but instead continues her tour to show the "The Witch of the Lake". Meanwhile the Doctor and Tegan, in the past, continue to try and figure out what to do. Tegan, realising a pickaxe would be helpful for a plan she has to tunnel out, goes looking for one inside the TARDIS but Sabaoth, projecting itself through the consumed TARDIS conscious, traps her inside the TARDIS and the Doctor tries to get inside but gets locked out. Tegan and the creature talk and it flings her mind forward in time as it drains her energy.

The Doctor managed to get inside the TARDIS and finds Tegan collapsed on the floor and he finally confronts Sabaoth. In the present, he guides Leanne through the catacombs where they find his tomb, where his body is buried. However, he stops Leanne from breaking it open, explaining that currently he's both dead and alive, like a Schrodinger's ghost, as they neither know whether he is actually dead or alive (he's supposedly dead, but she can still hear his voice so he might be alive and neither believes in ghosts) and that observing the body of him actually being dead will create a fixed point in time, ensuring his death. The Doctor hopes to find a way to avoid this but Leanne is still considering breaking in if it means she will be rid of the voice in her head.

Tegan slowly reawakens and explains to the Doctor she went to the future and tried to warn them but is not sure it worked. The last of her energy drains away and the two share a heart-felt moment before she passes on. The Doctor explains in the present to Leanne that he realises now he's here to save her and they hear a voice calling from around them. The Brotherhood of Sabaoth surrounds them and encroaches on them, however, he tries to calm her down explaining that they're not real in the ordinary sense and are more like smoke and mirrors/illusions projected by Sabaoth and Leanne makes a run for it.

Some time ago, a boy and his girlfriend Katya play a game with a Ouija board and Katya becomes possessed, warning them that "Sabaoth is coming".

In the past the Doctor berates Sabaoth for killing Tegan and prepares to suffer his fate. Sabaoth continues to taunt the Doctor and slowly drain his energy while he continues walking around and staying active to not succumb to sleep and have the rest of his energy swiped by Sabaoth. The two continue to talk as the Doctor walks through the dead TARDIS and Sabaoth explains he plans to keep feeding on everything else by bringing himself into the universe from his spectral form.

In the present Leanne continues to run from the illusory cloaked men and the Doctor explains that she has traversed so much of the sites and crossed the many psychic barriers that Sabaoth is using her as an anchor. Meanwhile Katya is brought to an expert exorcist by her boyfriend and the exorcist lulls her into a trance where she attempts to warn them that they must not let Sabaoth free. She cries that they must find the Doctor while the expert attempts to perform an exorcism, when suddenly the voice inhabiting Katya cries that they need to listen to her and that they don't understand as her name is Tegan Jovanka...

Part four
Leanne awakens the next morning to find that she has managed to escape the Brotherhood but the Doctor explains that she was supposed to and explains that Sabaoth planted a trigger in her mind and that going back into the catacombs will be catastrophic, however, she berates him, explaining she needs to pay her rent even if the world will end because of it (as he explained) and will be going back again to give a tour tonight. In the past, the Doctor builds a wall around himself and the dead TARDIS as he dies, explaining to Sabaoth that he cannot allow people to get their hands on the body of a dead Time Lord. Leanne has lunch in a cafe and when she refuses to follow the Doctor's advice he begins to cause things in the cafe to shatter, break or rumble. Overwhelmed, Leanne tries to shut him down and accidentally manifests telekinetic powers, blowing out the city's electricity supply but at the very least she can no longer hear the voice of the Doctor in her head.

Later, Leanne gives a tour of the catacombs but begins hearing whispers and voices that she cannot block out. She explains that in the residence built on top of them, two students playing with a Ouija board in one apartment lead them to rediscover the catacombs running underneath the entire street (Katya and her boyfriend). She then leads them to the Temple of Sabaoth, and her patrons are revealed to be the Brotherhood of Sabaoth. As she prepares for her fate, the Doctor reveals himself just as Sabaoth appears.

The Doctor reveals he escaped death by going into a healing coma (an ability of Time Lords) after he had sealed himself inside and projected himself into the head of the person that Sabaoth was using to be bring himself back into the world, Leanne. The Doctor and Leanne face Sabaoth together.

The Doctor awakens to discover himself in a fully operational and energised TARDIS which he used to go back and save Nyssa from being drowned and Adric from being hanged, as it turns out Leanne's telekinetic outburst was channeling Sabaoth's power and managed to send him back in time and restore some power to the TARDIS, allowing him to go save the others. In the present the Doctor, Nyssa, Adric and Tegan encourage Leanne to fight Sabaoth and she manages to suppress his return. They manage to vanquish him and the Doctor explains when he projected his mind into Leanne's he implanted a "virus" in it that she passed on to Sabaoth and coupled with having access to his powers as the two were linked, Sabaoth had set itself up for destruction.

The Doctor further explains that he ensured Nyssa and Adric were sent to points that would eventually lead to them becoming spots on her ghost walk and that he lied to Sabaoth about Tegan and put her into a cryo-pod so she could heal and it wouldn't feed on her, then woke her up "almost" immediately after. They then dressed up in cloaks to blend in with the brotherhood that followed Leanne through her tour and that was when they appeared to help her defeat Sabaoth. He then explains that things should be back to normal from now with no more supernatural occurrences, which Leanne is thankful for, saying "she never really believed in ghosts".

Cast

 * The Doctor - Peter Davison
 * Adric - Matthew Waterhouse
 * Nyssa - Sarah Sutton
 * Tegan - Janet Fielding
 * Leanne - Fenella Woolgar
 * Matthew - Sacha Dhawan
 * Sabaoth - Stephen Greif
 * Mrs Stubbs - Carolyn Seymour
 * Giles - Philip Childs
 * Louie - John Banks
 * Nancy - Rebecca Tromans

Continuity

 * Nyssa tells Matthew about the death of her father Tremas (TV: The Keeper of Traken) and an encounter with a "giant frog". (TV: Four to Doomsday)
 * The Doctor refers to the TARDIS as a "she". The TARDIS would later inhabit the body of a female named Idris. He also mentions that it is a living entity. (TV: The Doctor's Wife)
 * The Doctor mentions the HADS. (TV: The Krotons, Cold War et al.)
 * When preparing for the worst, the Doctor offers some comfort at the sudden change by saying "Deep breath!". This exclamation was used as the title for the first episode of the Twelfth Doctor's era. (TV: Deep Breath)
 * Tegan once again exclaims, "Rabbits!" (TV: Logopolis, Frontios, et al.)
 * Tegan is still trying to get to Heathrow Airport (TV: Logopolis, et al.)
 * Nyssa falls in love again when she and the Doctor visit Stockbridge in the 21st century. (AUDIO: Circular Time: Autumn)
 * Nyssa is put on trial for being a witch and the villagers attempt to dunk her by putting her in a ducking stool. A similar trial is performed on the Thirteenth Doctor when she is also accused of being a witch. (TV: The Witchfinders)
 * After Tegan's energy is drained and she dies, the Doctor puts her body in stasis and says "Brave heart Tegan". (TV: Earthshock et al.)
 * The Doctor creates a tomb for himself so that his body will not be found, as the body of a Timelord can be turned into a dangerous weapon in the wrong hands. The Eleventh Doctor's body had to be burned after he was killed on Lake Silencio, as even a single Timelord cell could be dangerous in the wrong hands. The Tenth Doctor burned the Master's body after he refused to regenerate from a bullet wound in order to stop it from falling into the wrong hands. (TV: The Last of the Time Lords, The Impossible Astronaut)