The Last Love Song of Suzie Costello (audio story)

was the seventy-first story in the Torchwood - Monthly Range by Big Finish Productions. It was written by Rafaella Marcus.
== Publisher's summary ==
An island has appeared in the North Atlantic Ocean. Suzie Costello comes to investigate and finds a crashed spaceship on the seabed. Inside the spaceship is a mystery. And also something Suzie has never dreamed of...
== Plot ==
Suzie takes an experimental Torchwood submarine to Surtsey and, after telling biologist Magda to leave the island, finds the eco-vessel Orion beneath the sea. After being decontaminated, she meets Anwir in a garden and runs with him to the control room when an explosion lets in one of the dragon-like Cetea which he scares away with the jets. Anwir claims that he is a human born in the 32nd century who came back in time through the Mid-Atlantic Ridge forty years ago, creating Surtsey, and has been living in the ship since using a regeneration field to slow his ageing. She decides to leave as he is not what she has come looking for, but she realises that her submarine was lost in the explosion.
With Suzie's help, Anwir seals the damage to the docking bay. She saves him from being killed by a tear in his suit and bandages him in the medbay, after which he takes her to the engine room and she deduces that Orion has run out of its fuel: galactic cosmic rays. She tells Anwir about how she came in search of the missing Torchwood group, wanting to prove herself to her colleagues, and suggests that they blow up the ship to propel themselves to the surface in escape pods and get Torchwood's help. However, Anwir claims that the ship is carrying cargo which he needs to get to a group of colonists in the future and she instead suggests they create a Rift Manipulator to send him back through the Ridge.
Anwir invites Suzie to join him in going to the 32nd century and she agrees to think about it, having always wanted to see the universe. She learns from accessing the computer that there was no heat or oxygen in the ship until her arrival and runs away from Anwir, finding humans being grown in incubators. The Orion computer reveals that it made Anwir with the help of her brainwaves to deceive her into helping it return home and that it has actually been hunting Cetea for a profit. Suzie kills Anwir with a shovel and agrees to activate the Rift Manipulator she has built so long as she is kept safe, but she instead activates the auto-destruct and returns to the surface in her submersible suit.
Suzie is heartbroken and cries, wondering how much longer she can work for Torchwood without ever getting any sort of reward for her efforts. Surtsey returns to the sea and she suggests that Magda send probes into the sea to find the survivor of the Cetea, which may or may not have survived the destruction of Orion.
== Cast ==
* Suzie Costello - Indira Varma
* Anwir - James Backway
* Orion - Danielle Kassaraté
* Magda - Amanda Shodeko
== Worldbuilding ==
* Magda studies at the University of Iceland.
* Magda drinks white jasmine tea.
* Suzie compares her suit's AI to David Attenborough.
* Anwir says that Captain Roamer was his mother.
* Anwir says that petrol is barbaric and solar panels are retro.
* Suzie mentions the Rift Manipulator.
* Suzie mentions that Torchwood has four branches; her one in Wales, one in London, one in Scotland and one that is missing.
== Notes ==
* This audio was recorded on 2 August 2022 at The Soundhouse.
== Continuity ==
to be added
== External links ==
Category:Series 8 (BFTW) audio stories
Category:2023 audio stories
Category:Stories set in London
Category:Stories set in the 1970s