State of Decay (Doctor Who)

After the events of Full Circle, the Fourth Doctor, Romana, K9, and their newest companion/stowaway, Adric, arrive on a planet with a feudal society. The villagers live under the thrall of three lords—Zargo, Camilla, and Aukon—who dwell in a shadowy Tower, and experience a yearly ritual called "the Selection", in which young villagers are taken to the tower, never to be seen again. This selection process is enforced by a thuggish band of guards led by Habris.

The Doctor and Romana discover evidence of technology considerably more advanced than the medieval level of development of the planet, and wonder what happened to cause the planet to devolve to its current rustic condition—to be in a "state of decay". Romana suggests that there is a powerful force holding the inhabitants back. As the two leave the village they are seized by cloaked figures. Adric comes to the village and is caught by the owners of the feeding house. Adric is discovered and captured by Lord Aukon, who sees him as an alien and worthy of becoming one of the 'chosen ones'.

The cloaked figures, members of a resistance movement, convey the Doctor and Romana to a secret base filled with forbidden technology. Kalmar is a scientist—a heretical role in their society—and is very grateful for the Doctor's help in repairing a computer which reveals the names and faces of the original chief officers of the spaceship Hydrax—who look exactly like the Lords of the Tower.

The Lords too have learnt of Romana and the Doctor, and Aukon sends a flock of his winged servant bats to menace them. The bats spare them and the Doctor and Romana are seized by Habris and his guards and taken to an audience in the Tower. Zargo and Camilla entertain them, then are called away to deal with a situation called the Arising. The Doctor and Romana discover that the great Tower in which the Lords dwell is itself the spaceship Hydrax, originally from Earth, which also was pulled into E-Space long ago.

The Doctor and Romana discover rows of drained corpses, while the craft's fuel stores are full of blood. Talk turns to vampires and the fact that nearly every inhabited planet has at least one legend about them. They find an amphitheatre, its floor pulsing to a loud heartbeat. It is there that the Lord Aukon greets them, inviting them to become the first of the new servants of the Chosen Ones. When they refuse, Aukon tries to ensnare the Doctor. Romana saves him, but before they can escape, Zargo and Camilla find them and they are taken as future meals for the 'Great One'.

The Doctor has deduced (by applying principles of consonant shifting) that the current lords' names are a corruption of the original crew's last names (i.e. "Sharkey" became "Zargo", "MacMillan" became "Camilla", and "O'Connor" became "Aukon"). He realises that the three lords are not descendants, but members of the original crew, mutated into vampires while the subjects beneath them are the descendants of the other colonists, made dull and primitive by over twenty generations of breeding and oppression. He is reminded of ancient Time Lord stories of the Great Vampires—ancient enemies of the Time Lords. He deduces that the Great One escaped destruction at the hands of the Time Lords by somehow retreating into E-Space, and it managed eventually to gather enough power to pull the old Earth ship into this universe, corrupt the main crew and use the colonists for its own ends.

Meanwhile, a rebel called Tarak infiltrates the Tower, freeing the Doctor and Romana. The Doctor returns to the TARDIS, while Romana stays with Tarak to search for Adric. As they try to snap Adric out of his trance, they unknowingly awaken Zargo and Camilla. Tarak is killed by Zargo, but the blood of the dead will not satisfy either of the lords. Adric throws a knife at Zargo, who pulls it out and heads for Romana while Camilla advances on Adric.

Aukon intervenes and compels them to stop, for he was the first to have contact with the mind of the Great One and he alone possesses the mental power the other two crave. He wants Adric as a Chosen One and Romana, a Time Lord, for sacrifice at the Arising, the first taste of revenge for their master.

In the throne room, the Hydrax's former control deck, Romana and Adric argue about their fate. Adric announces that he wants to be one of the 'chosen ones' (i.e. a vampire). They are taken to the bottom of the Tower (as shown in the picture above).

In the TARDIS the Doctor and K9 discover that the Great Vampires could only be defeated by metal bowships designed by Rassilon, fast ships firing steel bolts that speared the monsters through the heart, (the source of the tradition of the wooden stake for lesser vampires). He takes the TARDIS to Kalmar's base and there uses scanning equipment to scan the Tower. Under the stores of blood he finds a restless, demonic presence, like an immensely ugly human with bat wings, whom he determines to be the last Great Vampire. He warns it is about to be revived. After seeing it, Kalmar, Ivo and many other villagers agree to help.

The villagers and K9 make an assault on the Tower. The Doctor heads off to the peak of the Tower. Inside, Adric reveals he was faking his joining to the Lords to arrange an escape, but is unable to attack Aukon and free Romana. The Doctor rigs one of the spaceship/tower's old scoutships to launch and fall back toward the ground, driving itself into the heart of the subterranean Great One. The sounds of the ship launching snap Romana from her trance.

With the Great One dispatched, the three vampire Lords crumble to dust. The Doctor finds Romana and Adric and they leave the planet, hoping that, now freed from the corruptive effect of the vampires, it will develop once again toward its former advanced state and even, perhaps, surpass it.

Working titles for this story included The Wasting and The Witch Lords.[3] The serial was a re-written version of a story originally entitled The Witch Lords, later retitled The Vampire Mutations, which Dicks had submitted to the series in 1977, but which had been pulled just before production because of fears of a possible conflict with the BBC's Count Dracula, a high-profile adaptation of Bram Stoker's classic novel Dracula. It was replaced by Horror of Fang Rock (1977).[4]

This serial and the following Warriors' Gate featured an improved K9 prop.

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• State of Decay at BBC Online