The Creed of the Kromon

"It's the home of the Kromon. It's where we'll all die."

Writer: Philip Martin 

Format: Audio

Released: January 2004

Series: Main Range 53

Featuring: Eighth Doctor, Charley, C'rizz

Synopsis 

The Interzone is a fearsome nether-world protecting a zone ruled by the Kromon. Theirs is an aird land of dust and dying trees. Across the landscape are spheres that look like giant anthills. The Doctor believes that within one of these structures lie the clues that will lead him to his lost TARDIS. 

The spheres are ruled by the insect-like Kromon who covet the TARDIS. When Charley is captured she is forced to metamorphose into a hybrid-insect Queen, and to save her, the Doctor must barter his knowledge of space-travel technology, all the while knowing that he risks opening up all the realms of space to a rapacious race whose creed is not to create, only to plunder. 

Verdict 

The Creed of the Kromon was an excellent audio adventure to continue along the Eighth Doctor and Charley story arc in the Divergent Universe! Following on from the intriguing Scherzo, I was glad to see that after that story and Zagreus, the Eighth Doctor has returned to his normal loving and Edwardian self which with the Edwardian adventures Charlotte Pollard, we have my favourite audio pairing back in full flow. The placing of adventures in the Divergent Universe is a fantastic opportunity for adventures and one of my favourite things about this story was the fact that the Kromon had no concept of time. This alien universe merely has a grasp of space and it seems that time is simply irrelevant here which is quite extraordinary and actually a rather difficult concept to wrap my head around. How can a universe exist without time? But one of my main questions was how a universe that has no concept of time would effect the TARDIS. Everything seems very engineered here and with the talk of experiments before and after the Doctor and Charley interchanged between zones, I get the feeling the Kro'ka knows exactly where the TARDIS is and is sending the Eighth Doctor on a wild goose chase. I know we have four more adventures in a row with what is now this trio, so I am going to hazard a guess that the TARDIS won't be retrieved until the end of the final story. I just hope the build up is worth it but it does seem extremely weird not having the TARDIS appear in numerous consecutive stories. The story was a good one and I did like the Kromon as enemies. They were firstly presented as insect like and I must admit I feared for something similar to what we had in The Web Planet but thankfully my fears were not realised. In saying that though, I thought the Fifth Doctor story Return to the Web Planet allowed the Zarbi to work really well. Maybe that's because we couldn't see them? Who knows. The voices of both the Kromon and Kro'ka were very good and definitely didn't seem out of place for the Divergent Universe. I really liked the Oroog and he was rather nice in risking his life to help the Doctor, Charley and C'rizz. He was quite subtle at first which was good and just added my interest that little bit more. Listening on the train back to South Wales from across the border in England, in what is now a familiar train ride, it gives an alternative viewpoint than just listening in an isolated view in my opinion. I'm not sure whether it's because I listen to the whole story back to back or because my surroundings are different but I definitely notice a different grasp on an audio story when doing it on the train. I usually opt for books but I thought it had been too long since my last Main Range audio so I got back into things and I didn't regret it. The setting of different spheres, whether bio or alpha, was excellent and was an aspect of the story that I very much enjoyed. The references to Vengeance on Varos and Storm Warning were magnificent but I must say I loved the talk of Bloodtide with Darwin and the reptiles mentioned, who were of course referring to the Silurians. The story behind C'rizz and L'da was extremely sad, especially when the former had to put his lover out of misery by killing her. The Doctor was determined he wouldn't have to do the same for Charley when she became the new Queen. With the help of the Oroog, the Doctor managed to turn off the Kromon's water supply which they needed in vast quantities to function. Charley had received an antidote and all was about well. Their stay in Eutermes wasn't all that great and the TARDIS had not been located, but C'rizz was now part of the team and there's already questions about his loyalty. There's intrigue and mystery there, and I like that. 

Rating: 8/10