Taking the Stone
A distressed Chiana is looking for some reassurance from her otherwise-occupied crewmates; their apparent disinterest motivates her to take a shuttle and head off of Moya. The others soon discover the source of her troubles – a life-disc that had kept her aware of her brother has blinked out, indicating his death. When Crichton, Rygel and Aeryn track her down to a nearby cemetery planet, they find her in no rush to return. Indeed, she’s found comfort with the group of young daredevils that live beneath the surface, and announces her intent to join in one of their rituals, a chasm dive called “taking the stone” that is sometimes but not always fatal, thanks to an intermittently functioning forcefield generator. For the natives, even death by the stone is an attractive option, since radiation poisoning means everyone will soon die a slow painful death anyway. Crichton refuses to accept any of this, searching for a way to prevent the radiation sickness and talk Chiana out of jumping. But it doesn’t seem like anyone’s interested in what solutions he might offer.
written by Justin Monjo
directed by Rowan Woods
music by SubvisionGuest Cast: Anthony Hayes (Molnon), Peter Scarf (Das), Michela Noonan (Vyna), Natasha Beaumont (Janixx)
LogBook entry by Dave Thomer
The Doctor and Ace arrive on the rainforest world of Kar-Charrat, where expatriate Time Lord Elgin has become the librarian of the largest storehouse of knowledge in the universe. Elgin eagerly shows the Doctor his latest innovation: a wetworks facility which has assimilated all of this knowledge into a single consciousness. The Doctor is alarmed by this development, as it means that any invading force could take over the facility – and with it, all of the knowledge of the universe. Elgin admits that some races have tried to do exactly that, including the Daleks, but none have been successful. But the Doctor and Ace quickly learn on a first-hand basis that the Daleks haven’t given up – they intend to take over the library of Kar-Charrat and use the wetworks facility to create a new, all-knowing, all-powerful breed of Daleks. But the Daleks don’t achieve the desired results, even when the Doctor is forced to help – and everyone soon discovers that an even greater power than the Daleks exists on Kar-Charrat…a power which, if unleashed to rid the world of the mechanical invaders, could also exact revenge on a Time Lord guilty of enslaving Kar-Charrat’s indigenous creatures.