“The Curse of the Amorian Sector.”
A.k.a.
“Don’t press that switch….What switch? ….Bzzzt!…. Ouch!”
Cast: The Professor, Pirx the Pilot, Theodora and Mme Bouviour.
The Tardis gets a distress call form the Research ship “Kiev” which then disappears mysteriously. They trace it’s last known trajectory, and ion signature, only to find it has disappeared on the fringes of the Amorian Sector. This is a sort of Bermuda Triangle in space, where ships go missing. Every pilot worth his back-pay knows to avoid the Amorian sector like the plague. The Professor sets course directly for the Amorian Sector, and sets the Tardis down on a planet which is right in the middle of a blue fog. Theodora reads the computer display, only to find that she and the Professor have been logged as missing (presumed dead), lost forever in the Amorian Sector…..
[Sound off. Roll end credits…..]
(Pause for dramatic effect.)
[Then roll beginning credits.]
The Professor has found a real pea-soup fog to set down in. He pronounces the atmosphere fit for breathing and steps out. They have materialised on Althera V, right in the centre of the Amorian Sector. Althera V is the only remaining planet in the system, the others have all disappeared. There are numerous life-form readings though. Mme Bouviour comments that the blue argon gas fog reminds her of London smog. What doesn’t remind her of London smog however, is a swarm of mosquito-like insects, hungry for their blood. They all hurry back into the Tardis. Theodora energises the outside while releasing synthetic pheromones into the atmosphere. The two-inch mosquitos take the bait and fry on the energised Tardis hull.
Once more the crew venture out, and the Professor is desperate for something to shoot. He shouts loudly at a rustling in the undergrowth, Seconds later, a blue six-legged-and-horned tiger leaps on him, clawing and biting. The Professor grapples with the tiger, and Mme Bouviour helps by firing into the combat. Her gun goes off rather unexpectedly, blowing a hole in the Professor’s arm, ruining his coat, and his day, and also killing the beast.
This little incident sets off an explosive argument between the diminutive girl and the Professor. They are still arguing as the crew discover a force field in a clearing. The force field sweeps every few minutes, keeping the area clear of debris, and wildlife. In the clearing there are three pyramids made of stone, fifty, one hundred and two hundred feet tall, and also a small metallic pyramid. Theodora manages to rig a bypass to get through the force field, and the crew -by elimination- decide to investigate the central pyramid. (Not too high, not too short, but just right.)
They manage to bypass the security, and enter a very dark inner chamber. There are massive coils winding around the inner walls, all glowing softly. There is also a central console lit up with alien characters and symbols. None of the crew can make head nor tail of these, and simply decide they are a kind of record system for the pyramid’s builders.
They break into the second pyramid, to find that this too has a central console, but this time the inner shelves are lined with thousands and thousands of spaceships, satellites, and space debris, all in miniature. They realise that the pyramids are some sort of space defence system, and that the ships are not some sad space-ship spotter’s collection (none of the ships are suspended from the ceiling by cotton threads.)
They look carefully along the shelves, and find a miniaturised version of the Kiev. (Well spotted Pirx!) They sense life aboard, but realise that life support systems cannot cope forever in the environment now that the Kiev is only a few inches long.
They decide to bypass the security of the largest pyramid, and discover that the console in the middle gives a holographic display of the space defence sequence. The sequence runs like this:
Ships in the sector are caught in an energy field. They are then converted from matter to energy (in the large coils) the energy is then attenuated, (smaller coils) the signal is then converted back to matter, and transmitted to the holding pyramid.
As they figure it out, the system activates again, and another tiny ship duly appears in the smallest pyramid. Theodora reckons she can reverse the effect. The Professor and Pirx help out. Theodora manages to reverse the flow, but gets the effective scale wrong. The result is that the ship is reconstituted from a smaller signal strength, and arrives back in space only 95% its original size. (oops!) – The 6’8” captian is now only 6’4”, but the ship fits easier into the docking bay. Theodora then manages to shrink herself to the scale of the Kiev, and manages to persuade the crew of the ship to let her on board. She manages to convince them to save energy, and reduce life-support to a minimum. Once some of the crew are in cryo-sleep, the life of the vessel is extended. This proves to be enough time for Pirx to send it back through the defence system, and reconstitute it back in space. Theodora then transmats back to the planet’s surface.
As all the other ships are dead ships, they decide to download all the records of the lost ships, while the others rig the pyramids into a feedback loop that will blow up the entire budget for this episode in one spectacular pyrotechnic explosion. This they do, and run back to the Tardis. Seconds before the big firework, the metallic cylindrical Pyramid dematerialises, and vanishes into the vortex. The Tardis crew are all set for another adventure.
The Professor decides that he’s had enough of namby-pamby planets with only a few things to shoot, so he sets the co-ordinates for Skaro, (BBC sandpit) at the time when the Thals and the Kaleds are throwing 1000- megaton dirty nuclear bombs at each other.
When the Tardis rematerialises, they are in an arid windswept plain, with tall grass, and an ominous looking area, all blackened and burned. This is the place where puny humanoid flesh can really be put to good use, by wasting thousands of alien bodies and the entire BBC special effects budget.