The Ghost Machine

Gwen and Owen are in a foot pursuit of a petty thief who, according to sensors at the Torchwood hub, is making off with some kind of alien technology. Gwen grabs him, but he gets away, leaving her clutching his jacket, but Toshiko insists that Gwen’s snagged the alien tech. The device is found in one of the pockets, and when it activates, it instantly transforms Gwen’s surroundings – she’s still standing in a train station in Cardiff, but no one else is there except a terrified schoolboy, wearing a name tag and wandering alone…and then the experience ends. The name is tracked down to a man who says that the scene Gwen describes did happen to him – as a child, when he was evacuated to Cardiff to escape the Nazi bombing of London in World War II. The next time the device activates, it’s in Owen’s hands, but he witnesses a scene even more terrifying, in which a young man corners a terrified teenage girl. Again, Toshiko is able to narrow down the name of one of the people in Owen’s vision: a girl who was raped and murdered on the very spot where Owen stood. Knowing the identity of the victim, Owen becomes obsessed with finding out who the killer is. Doing so brings him into contact once again with the thief from whom the alien item was recovered, and a curious link between him and a killer who has never been brought to justice for his crime emerges.

written by Helen Raynor
directed by Colin Teague
music by Murray Gold and Ben Foster

Cast: John Barrowman (Captain Jack Harkness), Eve Myles (Gwen Cooper), Burn Gorman (Owen Harper), Naoko Mori (Toshiko Sato), Gareth David-Lloyd (Ianto Jones), Kai Owen (Rhys Williams), Gareth Thomas (Ed Morgan), Ben McKay (Bernie), Llinos Daniel (Eleri), John Normington (Tom Flanagan), Emily Evans (Lizzie Lewis), Christopher Elson (young Ed Morgan), Christopher Greene (young Tom Flanagan), Julie Gibbs (Bernie’s mum), Ian Kay (Snooker Player), Ryan Conway (Kid in arcade), Kathryn Howard (Woman in shop)

Notes: Welsh actor Gareth Thomas holds a legendary place among fans of British SF; he played revolutionary leader Roj Blake in the late 70s/early 80s space opera Blake’s 7. He has also guest-starred in a Big Finish Doctor Who audio play (Storm Warning, which reintroduced Paul McGann as the Doctor) and starred in the first two “seasons” of Big Finish’s spinoff series Dalek Empire. John Normington also has a long history with Doctor Who, with guest appearances in The Happiness Patrol (1988) and especially his turn as the treacherous Morgus in 1984’s Caves Of Androzani.