Lucy Manning

**Lucy Manning** was a young woman who wired herself up to a virtual reality simulation, in order to escape what she believed to be total devastation.

## Biography

Working as a technician, Lucy delivered a virtual reality system from a colony back to Earth which allowed trainees to learn how to control equipment without needing to operate the real thing; however, she arrived on Earth to find it a wasteland with everyone dead. Distraught, she reprogrammed the system to become a simulation of her idealistic life - hardwired to ensure she never could leave, even going as far to edit her memories.

In reality, the Earth wasteland that Lucy found wasn't the real Earth, but rather a replica created by Earth governments to test weapons on populated areas, without actually killing. As this was a time of humans only now making connections with other species, they were on the whole still rather unsure about them - deciding they were necessary, in case anyone turned on them.

In this simulation, she was a movie director who lived with her wife Alexandria and daughter Nessa. She attended a talk show one day to promote her upcoming movie, where she expressed her gratitude towards “the studio” for fast-tracking the production of her new film. The host them made a remark about how they seemed to do that for all her movies, which got a laugh from the audience but left Lucy a little confused.

Lucy went about her life; filming her movie, attending dinners and the like, but failed to notice that everything was a little too perfect. What she did notice was two people always watching - the Fifteenth Doctor and Pax I. They tried on multiple occasions to catch up to Lucy and talk to her, but something always prevented them. Eventually, they met Lucy whilst she was waiting for coffee - agitated, as it had taken them a great deal of effort to get to her.

The Doctor broke the truth that her world was a lie, having discovered her ship in space, where she and Pax found her hooked up in a VR system, but confessed they couldn't understand why she was so deeply intertwined with the system or why it wouldn't let anyone say the world was a fake. Lucy ran off back home and got there unnaturally quickly, to find Alexandria waiting for her, who she embraced; but with her mind now open to the possibility of reality, she properly noticed Alexandria’s stilted responses - void of emotion or personality. Trying to elit something using random questions, she realised the Doctor was actually correct, following continued bland answers.

Having caught up with her, the Doctor explained the truth to Lucy behind the Earth which she came across and gave her a choice; get disconnected from the simulation or be left in the system, where she would wipe her memory again and move her ship somewhere it couldn't be discovered again. After telling her to close her eyes, she stated the system wouldn't let her manually disconnect her, so she reprogrammed it; it would disconnect her if she opened her eyes - but if she kept them continuously closed, it eventually would reset her memory back to before meeting the Doctor and Pax, meaning she could remain in the system forever.

With her eyes closed, she called out to Alexandria asking what to do; who whispered in her ear - “let go” - and Lucy opened her eyes, disconnecting herself. (TV: *Final Cut*)