Part of the short lived Unbound series, this story asks "What if the Valeyard had won?" though I think a more accurate premise is what if after foiling his plans, the Doctor at the last minute decided to return to the matrix to save the Valeyard and the two ended up trapped locked in combat, what if the wrong person won that battle?

The most interesting part of the story is following the Valeyard as we get to see just how much chaos he would cause, a Doctor with no restraint untainted by conscience. For Michael Jayston's return to the role since Trial of a Time Lord, he really gives the Valeyard a chilling and demented edge, how he continuously taunts and threatens his companion and is willing to manipulate events of the past to get the outcome he desires. Mel's side of the story is to track down the Valeyard in the hopes of bringing the old Doctor back, or failing that killing him and she gets some badass moments. But unfortunately the ending is what derails the story for me, without going into spoilers, it uses a variation of "it was all a dream", which renders most of the story, including Mel's completely meaningless. It's still a harrowing ending that places our main characters in a hopeless situation, there was just a cleverer way to execute it than having the story mostly be an illusion.

I found this so moving and so fun.  What starts out as an intriguing alternate ending to the Trial of the Time Lord storyline, soon turns into an epic alt-universe adventure starring Mel as she confronts the Valeyard, whose attempts to meddle in the timeline ultimately lead to reality unravelling around him.  The Valeyard doesn't feel like the villain of this story, more like this being trapped in this horrible paradox he cannot escape from.  It's dark, surreal, and intimately interesting.  Compared to a lot of these other early Unbound stories, it and Deadline are a lot closer to what I expected.  I don't need slightly darker Doctor Who stories, but I definitely could use weird, reality-breaking, mind-bending, creative content like what I got out of He Jests at Scars.

The performers also enhance this one quite a bit.  The alternate Doctors and casting used in other Unbound stories is alright, but getting Bonnie Langford to basically carry the main plot forward was a huge asset to this audio.  She brings so much to the role and it really shows just how much the show originally squandered this companion's potential.  Maichael Jayston's return to the Valeyard role was also extremely memorable.  He's so good at the end playing this pitiable, broken figure.  He's a man tearing down everything around him just trying to survive and exist.  It's extremely compelling stuff, from my perspective.