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Context Recap / BigFinishDoctorWho162ProtectAndSurvive

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1A great tremendous noise [[GoodMorningCrono wakes up Hex!]] (Like a Steam engine giving birth.) the [[Recap/DoctorWhoS18E7Logopolis Cloister bell rings]]! (Bad news!) And ... the Doctor's not responding to it. Which means he's not in the TARDIS, so Hex and Ace are by themselves. (Worse news!)
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4Ace and Hex land in 1989, during WorldWarIII. .... Oh dear. Even ''worse'' news. But, when the world is heading straight for complete and utter fallout, there is something far worse that decides the fate of mankind.
5
6The first part of the Elder Gods trilogy.
7
8----
9!! Protect and Survive has examples of the following tropes:
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11* AlternateTimeline: It's 1989, and the Russians and the West are involved in World War III, and it's nuclear. Also, Vladimir Kryuchkov is the Russian president and not Gorbachev.
12* AnachronicOrder: The second part starts off with the Doctor, prior to Ace and Hex's involvement.
13* AsTheGoodBookSays: LET THERE BE LIGHT
14* BatmanGambit: The Doctor claims he's stopped the Elder Gods. They decide to move their consciousness towards the future to see if he ''has''. They end up in human bodies without their powers.
15* BiggerOnTheInside: Namedropped by Hex.
16* BlindedByTheLight: Hex looks at the bomb strike, and sees his arm (XRaySparks 's skeleton more like) and he loses his sight.
17** TemporaryBlindness
18* CallBack: [[Recap/DoctorWhoS18E7Logopolis The Cloister bell]] goes off.
19** The TARDIS that the Doctor uses to get to Peggy and Albert is [[Recap/BigFinishDoctorWho151TheDoomsdayQuatrain black]].
20** Hex still holds a grudge against the Doctor for [[Recap/BigFinishDoctorWho139ProjectDestiny not telling him about his mother]].
21* ColdOpen: The TARDIS in bad form! The Cloister bell ringing... And where's the Doctor!?
22* ContinuityNod: Ace mentions having a [[Recap/DoctorWhoS25E1RemembranceOfTheDaleks baseball bat]] in her bedroom, if Hex continues being so snarky.
23** Hex at one point mentions [[Recap/BigFinishDoctorWho115FortyFive Antartica]].
24* DeadpanSnarker: Hex is on form, especially in the ColdOpen.
25* DemonicPossession: The Elder Gods can do this to humans.
26* EldritchAbomination: The Elder Gods.
27* EvilGloating: Albert and Peggy to Ace and Hex when they figure a way out.
28* EvilSoundsDeep: The Elder gods. But ''especially'' Moloch.
29* EquivalentExchange: In order for Peggy and Albert to escape they need Ace and Hex.
30* FalloutShelterFail: While staying with Albert and Peggy Marsden, Ace and Hex help them build a fallout room in their cellar using boxes of soil to absorb radiation - all in accordance with leaflets provided by the local government. Hex reflects that these are largely there to keep people calm and they probably won't be much help in the event of a real nuclear blast. Sure enough, when a nuclear ICBM wipes out the local RAF base, the radioactivity of the strike zone renders all their preparations completely useless and all four of them end up being exposed to a lethal dose of radiation. Thankfully, the GroundhogDayLoop manages to undo this.
31* FailedASpotCheck:
32** Ace and Hex are in the fallout shelter for nine days, but during that time, they don't notice anything amiss about the fact that the radio is still working. It's not until after Albert and Peggy have died for the first time that they remember the EMP and wonder how they can be receiving radio reports...
33** When the TARDIS appears, Hex is so anxious to get the hell out of the prison dimension that he stars up the dematerialization sequence without even noticing the two other people in the TARDIS.
34* FleeingForTheFalloutShelter: Given that Albert and Peggy aren't up to moving quickly, Ace and Hex are stuck helping them down the stairs to the fallout room - during which Hex is blinded by the flash from the bomb. All four of them barely get to the shelter in time, surviving mostly unharmed... but unfortunately, the shelter was too close to the strike zone, and they begin experiencing the effects of acute radiation sickness soon after. Fortunately, the time loop means that everyone's soon alive again; less fortunately, the apocalypse cannot be stopped, and the sprint for the shelter is essential [[ImmortalityHurts unless you feel like burning alive this time around]].
35* {{Foreshadowing}}: Early in the story, Ace and Hex split up so they can help Albert and Peggy get the fallout shelter in working order. During this time, Albert tells Hex that he's been living in the countryside since he retired, but Peggy later contradicts this by saying that she remembers her son playing Cowboys and Indians in the garden when he was a little boy. This is the first hint that the two of them aren't who they say they are - and aren't even human at all.
36* GoToAlias: Doctor John Smith, par for the course.
37* GroundhogDayLoop: Albert and Peggy are stuck in a loop that begins on the day of the war, continues through the post-apocalyptic days that follow, until they die of radiation sickness a week later and the loop begins all over again.
38* HeWhoFightsMonsters:
39--> '''Ace''': You make him (The Doctor) sound like a monster.
40--> '''Hex''': Sometimes he gets so close to the monsters it's [[NotSoDifferentRemark hard to keep them apart]].
41* HeadacheOfDoom: After the bombing, Ace, Hex, Albert and Peggy appear to have escaped the cataclysm mostly unharmed... but then Peggy begins experiencing a painkiller-resistant headache, followed closely by bleeding gums - a sure sign that they've all sustained a lethal dose of radiation.
42* {{Hologram}}: A recording of the Doctor when the right conditions have been met.
43* MutuallyAssuredDestruction: A false alarm triggers the Russians into firing unto innocent people, which would kickstart a global nuclear war.
44** [[ShownTheirWork Which is based]] [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1983_Soviet_nuclear_false_alarm_incident on a real life incident]].
45* NoCelebritiesWereHarmed: The “Protect and Survive” radio announcements are (initially) based on the real life campaign voiceovers by Patrick Allen.
46* NukeEm: Russia to the UK.
47* OminousHairLoss: Not long after they find that they've been exposed to a lethal dose of radiation, Ace admits to the blinded Hex that she found a lot of hair on her pillow that morning, gloomily remarking that "the skinhead look" doesn't suit her.
48* OutOfTimeOutOfMind: Albert and Peggy don't act any different, despite being stuck in a GroundhogDayLoop where they're cursed to die from radiation poisoning every 10 days for over 100 years. This is actually one of many hints that the two of them aren't human...
49* PocketDimension: Pocket Timeline, but still. Constitutes about 5 miles around the house.
50* PublicDomainSoundtrack: [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNb54rwDQJM The Volga Boat Men]] song is used in the background for when the Russians enter the scene.
51* ReadTheFreakingManual: Peggy and Albert have been following the instructions on the radio to the letter for hundreds of years. Ace suggests to Hex they should do the ''opposite''. Seeing as the voice is the Doctor's.
52* ResurrectionDeathLoop: Peggy and Albert are stuck in an infinite loop of suffering, death and resurrection... and eventually, so are Ace and Hex.
53* SecretTestOfCharacter / SadisticChoice: Ace and Hex have to make a decision. Leave, and leave the other behind, or stay and let the other leave. The right answer is; both stay. So both can go.
54* SheIsNotMyGirlfriend: Peggy asks Hex if he and Ace are ... ? He replies "No. She'd have me for breakfast."
55* ShoutOut: Albert mentions the reason why he remembered Vladimir Kryuchkov's name so well is because he sounds like a Franchise/JamesBond villain.
56** Hex quite literally calls out to ''Film/GroundhogDay''.
57* TakeThat: Peggy doesn't want to be called "Margaret" because it reminds her of [[http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Thatcher that woman]].
58* ToBeContinued: Ace and Hex enter the story with a white TARDIS, and exit in a black one, with two other people. Ending in a blatant SequelHook.
59* ToThePain:
60--> We can make you feel the pain of burning to death from the strength of a nuclear explosion a hundred times... a thousand times over and over again...
61* WhamLine:
62--> '''The Doctor''': Find out what it feels like the way a human feels it, find it the way to suffer the way a human does it, find out what it's like ''to die''.
63* XRaySparks: The Nuclear blast that hits causes the people hit by it to see their own skeletal structure through their flesh first. Then comes the ''heat blast''.
64* YearInsideHourOutside
65* YouAreTooLate: InvertedTrope, ''the Doctor'' pulls this on the Elder Gods.

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