The girl crept upstairs to the landing to avoid the dreadful singing. What was this ‘Old Lang Chine’, she wondered. Was it similar to Black Gang Chine? Visiting that amusement park on the Isle of Wight was the best day of her life. She wrote to Father Christmas and asked if he could magic her there on Christmas Day. But he ignored that request and gave her some walnuts and a satsuma instead. And a watch, which was strange. Her dad asked where she’d stolen it from. But she wouldn’t let him take it. The watch was how she knew the grownups were wrong. The grandfather clock downstairs was fast.

She looked at the seconds tick past and started to count down from 10. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six. Five. Four. Three. Two. One.

“Hello young lady,” said the man in the crazy colourful clothes who had just appeared. Then he waved some kind of magic torch at her. Which beeped. “Not yet,” the man muttered under his breath. “What year is it?”

“It’s 1962… No, 1963. Just started,” she replied. “I’m Sia. And I’m six.”

“So am I!” was the unhelpful reply. The man was looking around. He had yellow and black striped trousers, like that clown she saw on the Isle of Wight.

“Are you from Black Gang Chine?” she asked.

“Should I be?”

“I thought Father Christmas must have sent you to take me there. I like it there.”

“Oh, everyone loves Black Gang Chine. But would you really like to be whisked away?”

“Yes.”

“I am not sure your parents would…” The man looked at his magic torch which changed

colour to pink and started buzzing. “I don’t have much time. Can you meet me back here in…” He looked back at the torch, his eyes widened. “In ten year’s time!”

“I’ll… try,” she said. The man flickered and was gone. Sia looked at her watch; it was just one minute past twelve. Sixty of the maddest seconds of her life. She heard footsteps on the stairs and her dad calling her down. She should probably be in bed. How many sleeps is ten years?

***

Three thousand nine hundred, and seventy one. That’s according to Sia’s ten-year diary. Which was, in fact, two five-year diaries glued together. The clown man better turn up.

He did.

“Sia? Is that you?” He looked exactly the same.

“Yes,” she replied, thinking she may as well go with it. However mad. “I’m just a little older.”

“I was going to say younger!” The man banged his magic torch which was now glowing orange. “This must be happening out-of-sync. But it’s still here!”

“What’s here?” she replied.

“The thing I’m detecting. It’s always here. How are you anyway?”

“I’m okay. Quite a lot has happened.” The man looked up from his torch.

“I like your dress!” Sia was wearing a patchwork frock made from offcuts and scraps: tartan, stripes, and colourful fabrics all stitched immaculately together.

“My father calls it ‘totally tasteless’. I told him to get with it. It is 1973!” She didn’t know why she was telling him this. But she’d waited so long and had forgotten all she’d planned to say over the last decade. “That’s what I’m going to call my fashion house: Totally Tasteless. When I get my degree. Just need to pass my A-Levels.”

“No! I’ve lost the readings! Again!” He threw up his arms and grabbed his temples in frustration. “See you back here in… Ten years time. Sorry.”

“Again! Can’t you just—”

“I’ll explain later. Don’t worry about your A-Levels! They don’t make you who you are!”

Sia checked her watch as she heard the sound of her boyfriend’s footsteps coming up the stairs. Another sixty seconds gone.

***

For Sia, 1983 was worse than that book, Nineteen Eighty-Four. Much worse. But here she was again. Just in case. In case she weren’t mad. She wanted to wear her patchwork dress. But she couldn’t face it. Probably wouldn’t fit now anyway. He appeared.

“Ah, I assume you are Sia? A little older. A lot older!”

“Yes. Just don’t ask me about my A-Levels.”

“Why would I do that?” The clown man checked the reading on that infernal torch. Which, on closer inspection, was more like a remote control with a light at the end. Glowing green.

“That’s what we talked about last time…”

“Did we?”

“You’ll be disappointed. Like dad.”

“No, I won’t.” He was only half listening, checking some readings on a what looked like a digital watch display.

“I didn’t take them in the end. Life got in the way. I’m twenty six now.”

“Ah, that explains everything.” He beamed a smile at Sia. “No wonder these readings don’t make sense. Twenty years, not ten.”

Sia felt the knot in her stomach. The ache that never goes away. Her son will be ten years old this year. All those little life events she will never experience.

“There’s something missing!” The man started tapping at the device.

“My son,” she replied instinctively.

“Was he here? Did he disappear?” The man flickered. Time was running out.

“No. I gave him away. Dad insisted.” She started sobbing.

“I can’t leave you like this…” He looked at the device, alarmed. “I’ll see you again… in ten years, okay? You need to believe in yourself. There’s something special about you. Trust me.”

Sia nodded, but, when she opened her eyes, he was gone. In sixty seconds. Again.

She went downstairs, alone this time.

***

Sia was surprised the patchwork dress still fitted her. Just. Those painful evenings at Weight Watchers had paid off. Sia couldn’t wait to tell him the news. But she wasn’t entirely sure

why.

This time, the colourful man was hovering about two feet above the floor. Until he gave the device a good whack and dropped suddenly, ending up tumbling onto his back.

“I did it!” Sia smiled at the man.

“Did what?”

“Got my life back on track. Thanks to you.”

The man rose back onto his feet. “Me? Are you sure?”

“I think you’re the first person who ever believed in me. You. A magical man who only appears once every ten years for 60 seconds.”

“Interesting,” he said. “Maybe it is about you. These readings still don’t make sense.” The device was glowing orange. “What year is this?”

“1993.”

“You said you got your life ‘back on track’. Did you mean a time track?”

“No. What? I went to university as a mature student. Trained in fashion design and I’m about to open my first shop: Totally Tasteless.”

He looked at her quizzically. “Of course you did. Anything else?”

“Well, I am getting married.”

“Not to a Krontep warrior king?”

“No,” she replied, thinking that might be obvious.

“Good. That’s how I lost my last friend. But I’ve got another one coming who seems very nice. I hope I’ll meet her soon. But you never know. Days like crazy pavings.” The man realised he was not paying attention to the business in hand, literally. And sixty seconds was nearly up. Again. “No, it’s not you. It’s not a person. It’s an objec…”

The man flickered away. Without even saying he would be back. But he will. And so would she. Her fiancée may want her to move in with him. But she will never leave this house. It’s hers now and she needs to always come back here. Next time they meet, maybe she’ll have a family of her own?

***

The Doctor arrived. But there was no one there. He called out Sia’s name but there was no reply. The lights were off. No one seemed to be home, but the house was still occupied.

The Doctor spotted Sia’s patchwork dress hung on the bannister. There was a note pinned to it.

The Doctor checked the readings on his temporal transportal. They were blank. Using the white beam as a torch, he read the note:

Dear person who appears every ten years for 60 seconds,

Sorry I can’t be with you this time. I haven’t gone anywhere. I just couldn’t face it. Last time I told you I was about to get married. And I did. We were happy at first. But he insisted we moved to South Africa so he could be with his parents and start a family. I never wanted to leave this place, for obvious reasons. I’m still here. But he’s gone.   Sorry, I couldn’t face you this time. I can’t explain any more; you only have 60 seconds.

Sia, 1 January (nearly), 2003

The Doctor dropped the device in shock. But before he could pick it up, he disappeared again. Sia opened the door opposite where she was peering through the crack. She walked onto the landing and picked up the device. It flickered to life again. She noticed a reading on the screen: 3,971.

***

The device had been counting down daily until it reached one on 31 December 2012. Sia didn’t really want to see the man again. Too many memories. But it was his property and it may help him escape his strange 60-second existence.

At the stroke of midnight, as always, he flickered into being. It was 2013 and the countdown stopped. She handed him the device. Sia pointed at her watch, tapped it, and said, “On time. As always. Sorry about last time.”

The man looked at her watch. It was glowing and emitting wisps of shimmering smoke.

“Where did you get that?” His eyes were wide and he pointed the device directly at her watch. It flashed like a rainbow.

“I got it from… Father Christmas!”

“No, you didn’t. It’s a Chameleon Arch. Someone must have hidden it here. Unusual design, a wristwatch. Have you ever opened it?”

“No. The battery seems to go on forever. I’ve never needed to.”

“Good. Now give it here!” She passed the man her watch. He pressed a few buttons on his device and pointed a red beam at it. The watch disappeared. And, in a flash, so did he.

***

Sia didn’t really expect the man to appear again. But she came anyway. It was like a tradition. She was 66 now, retired, and – frankly – not really that busy. Not busy enough not to come, if that makes sense. And it was only the top of the stairs. She can head straight to bed when he doesn’t show.

“Hello Sia!”

“Hello.” It was good to see him.

“I didn’t know whether you’d come.” He smiled.

“I got a new watch. A smart one. There was an alert already set in it when I bought it. Telling me to come here without fail at midnight. It’s 2023 now.”

“Yes, I must remember to do that,” he said. Making no sense, as usual. “I like your dress.”

“I like to keep my hand in. Even if I am retired and a little… broader. I used most of the old patches.”

“Very fetching! Totally tasteless, of course, but I love it!”

“You haven’t got that electronic thing with you.”

“No, I came by another means. My usual transport. Would you like to see it?”

“Of course. Do you have my watch? I know it’s not worth anything. But it has sentimental value. Got it when I was six.”

“I still am.” He laughed. “But I am afraid I had to return it to… where I come from. If the person trapped in that device had escaped. Well, there wouldn’t be a landing for us to meet on. Or this house. This street. This planet!” The man put his arms on her shoulders and looked directly in her eyes. “You realise that, by taking care of that watch, you saved the lives of everyone on Earth.”

Sia laughed. Of course she didn’t realise.

“Don’t upset me. I’m no one special. Haven’t made much of my life. Always lived here.”

“You are exceptional! You must have an instinct buried within you. If you hadn’t stayed here, the being trapped in that watch would have escaped and wreaked unknown havoc across the universe!”

There was something insistent about the man that made her believe him.

“I don’t even know who you are!”

“I am known as the Doctor. And I will explain everything on the way…” He beckoned her to go into the spare bedroom.

“The way where?”

“You are free now. Time for an adventure or two! Behind that door is a space and time machine. Now, you tell me where you want to go!”

His eyes lit up and his smile was so wide that she couldn’t say no. If she can be crazy for all those years. She can be crazy just one more time.

Sia thought for a moment then said, “Can we just go somewhere fun?”

“Fun? That sounds familiar. Of course! All right, I’ll take you to Black… Gang Chine!”

“You remembered! But I don’t need a space machine to get there. We could go by ferry!”

“Ah, but we’re going to the opening in 1843! Then we’re going to find your son.” The Doctor started to head off into the spare room.

Sia clocked her watch. “Hey, but it’s been longer than 60 seconds!”

The Doctor poked his head around the door. “As my dear friend Louis once remarked, we have all the time in the world. Come along!”

And with that, Sia headed towards the first of their many adventures… She sometimes used to think she wasted her life waiting for the Doctor. But it turns out it was worth every minute.

Despite being voted the longest-running science fiction television series of all time, very little has been written about the early years of Dr WHO. But, at last, we have uncovered the secret history of TV’s venerable Timelord traveller in time/space. Let’s time-skip back more than 47 years to the nineteen hundred and sixties…

It begins with a feisty Canadian firebrand called Syd Numan who angrily arrived at the BBC in 1963 demanding that they scrap all their prestigious costume dramas and instead produce a “TV series for oddball infants who like science, history, and geometry. Or you will all get a jolly good smacked bottom!” Because he was all red in the face and in an uncontrollable rage, the frightened BBC management gave him £426, seven shillings and sixpence to produce 87 episodes a year until at least 1993.

Within minutes, Numan became bored of the idea exclaiming, “What a load of crackpot!” So he blackmailed two confused older gents, Don Winston and CBE ‘Bunny Boy’ Webster (CBE) into taking over. Both were highly experienced old-school BBC producers and, as such, had no idea what they were doing.

Winston was keen for the series to be about a mysterious ‘twerp’ stranded on planet Earth because his time machine was irreparable. Episodes would centre around his bungling efforts to fix the ship and, frustratingly, never exploring the whole of space and time; while ‘Bunny Boy’ wanted the stories to feature a team of adventurers, ‘the teenies’, whose time machine had shrunk them so small they were invisible and inaudible. “It would be very cheap because you wouldn’t need any actors,” ‘Bunny Boy’ insisted.

Numan declared both these ideas as, “Total dishwater!” So, with only half an hour left before production started, they went back to the drawing board. Out of their frantic, manic drawings, as they sobbed hot tears, a TV legend was born… Dr WHO!

The lead character would be known as ‘Doctor ?’ because he had forgotten to write down his second name, and – now more than 7 million years old – he is too embarrassed to go back and ask*. He is described as a ‘randy old codger’ who lives in a junk shop where his ship ‘Tar-Dis’ has crash-landed, with his great-granddaughter, Sue-Ann.

Tar-Dis is the most powerful space-time/time-space ship in the known solar system but it looks really crap because the BBC didn’t have the budget for anything better. The ship is pretending to be a London Police BOX, which is why ‘Dr WHO’ is often mistaken for a policeman [An AI wrote that sentence].

Sue-Ann escapes ‘Doctor’s’ clutches and, despite being more than 108, seeks refuge at the local primary school, pretending to be six years old. Her history teacher, Iain Chestnut, is suspicious because – unlike the rest of the class – Sue-Ann refuses to take a nap in the afternoons and instead dances to beat music in her fab swinging sixties gear while talking about the day she stormed the Bastille.

Chestnut tells his colleagues (and secret lovers) science teacher, Babs Right, and geometry teacher, Babs Left, about his suspicions. Babs Right also airs her concerns: Sue-Ann had taken over the class and taught them how to make a nuclear fusion reactor. Babs Left had measured Sue-Ann and found her to be transcendentally dimensional. They decide to confront her mysterious great-grandpa in his junk pile…

When he found out much later, Numan described this new idea as, ‘Unforgivable tripe!’, then beat his fists against the studio wall until he drew blood. But there was no time to come up with anything better. The red light was on and filming had started…

Winston and ‘Bunny Boy’ had gone into hiding, leaving the show to be produced by the unknown fresh-faced, inexperienced, wet-behind-the-ears, Varsity Lamppost. She quickly dried the back of her ears and proved herself to be a billion times more competent than those two jokers. Despite being left with an opening episode written on 26 stitched-together fag packets, and eight further episodes set in the prehistoric era where the only word in the script was ‘grunt’, Varsity set to work.

She cast veteran screen idol, Billy Harnell as Doctor One, after her first choice, Dicky ‘Sir Pastry’ Lewes Misheard demanded that ‘Doctor’ should be “made out of pastry” (The BBC effects department vetoed this idea after an unsuccessful screen test: “Pastry got everywhere.”)

Harnell was keen to take on the role and perform in front of infants, having only played serial killers and bungling burglars up to this point. To soften his gruesome image, he insisted that his dialogue should include, “plenty of confusing nonsense and stupid-sounding errors” – these became known as ‘Billy fluffs’ or ‘Flufbills’.

The rest of the cast was made up of The Adventures of Sir Reginald Styles actor William Russell Enoch Russell (credited as Will E Russell), Jacqueline and Jilleline Hills (joint winners of Miss Cardigan 1958) as Babs Right and Babs Left, and Caro-Line Form as Sue-Ann. Form was 47 and had the tricky task of playing a 108-year-old pretending to be a 6-year-old acting like a teenager.

Performing in Dr WHO was a terrifying experience for these actors because, for the first five years, the show was recorded and broadcast live on stage in front of an unresponsive audience. And the very first episode proved to be a disaster.

Lamppost had appointed an untested, experimental new director, Warrick Hassan, who insisted that the sound of ‘banging doors’ featured loudly throughout the episode. Numan was enraged and ripped the curtain down at the end of the recording, taking to the stage to rant about the script, production, performances, and the state of his dressing room: “No bidet! You animals!”

He was furious that some of the dialogue had spoilt the mystery of the programme. At one point, Sue-Ann says, “We are aliens from the 49th century, part of a new science-fiction series that aims to bridge the gap on Saturday evenings between Grandstand and the pop music show Juke Box Jury. And also appeal to both audiences.”

With Numan sedated and incarcerated, Lamppost and Hussan set to work on a revised episode one. It started with a caption declaring: ‘PLEASE IGNORE LAST WEEK’S EPISODE’. This time, it was a success, with the audience cheering and applauding at the end. But little did they know that outside the studio, world events would scupper their second opening night…

While the episode was being broadcast, the President of the USA, John F Kenny was assassinated with a bullet. Whilst sad for America, it was a disaster for Dr WHO. With many viewers listening to the news instead of the BBC’s new science fiction series, the production team decided to remount the show the next week. It was another huge success, with many of the crowd calling for an encore: Harnell obliged by performing his ‘bungling burglar’ routine. But disaster struck again when, during the broadcast, the US President was shot for the second time in as many weeks. The production team reluctantly decided that, this time, they had to move on…

The remounted episode was followed by the ‘erotic caveman’ story, Tribe of Mummies, which proved to be a huge turn-off for viewers. The cast grunted their way in prehistoric times for the next eight weeks until Doctor hit the tribe leader on the head with a rock, and they made their escape, to the delight of both the Tar-Dis crew and the audience.

But it was the next story, The Deadly Planet AKA These Mutants AKA The Luxor Masters (the programme’s longest-ever episode title), that secured the show’s future. In desperation, Lamppost asked a failed comedian, Terrance National Express (TNE), to write the story. Strapped for cash, after being commissioned, TNE wrote seven scripts in the corridor outside Lampost’s office in about an hour, the last being just three words, “…and so on”. Then he stole the scriptwriting fee and flew away like a thief. Little did he know that he had accidentally written a masterstroke.

The Deadly Planet AKA These Mutants AKA The Luxor Masters pitted Doctor and his crew against a suitably deadly foe: Darleks. These robot creatures from the planet Scarred resembled upturned egg cups and spoke with an evil rasping cackle. While both infants and the fully-grown loved these fascist, murdering psychopaths, there was one man who took exasperated umbrage: the show’s own birth father, Syd Numan. He had been revived in order to attend the recording. But when Darleks appeared, he once again invaded the stage. In a fit of rage, Numan cried, “No BEMs! I said no BEMs,” before being dragged back into the wings by Jacqueline and Jilleline Hills.

The audience was shocked to witness this agonised outburst. Lamppost took to the stage and calmed the crowd, who assumed Numan had meant ‘No Black and Ethnic Minorities’. She explained that in Dr WHO’s DNA document, Numan had insisted the show should not include ‘Boggle Eyed Monstrosities’, and that’s what he thought the Darleks were. At that point, Numan freed himself from his shackles and burst back on stage.

The crowd started chanting: “We love Darleks, more psychopathic BEMs! More monstrous killers!” Numan was taken aback and his life-long, uncontrollable rage briefly subsided. He embraced Lamppost and declared, “I was so, so wrong! Bring on the BEMs!” In tears, he called the cast back to finish the episode.

This time, no president was assassinated and 53,508,513 viewers tuned in – the entire population of the UK, except for Dicky ‘Sir Pastry’ Lewes Misheard who couldn’t watch because he was still encased in pastry. Following this huge, runaway success, the BBC decided to destroy all copies of all the episodes forever.

That is the totally unbelievable story of the longest-running science fiction series in the world – as voted by you – which has now been on our screens for more than 47 years. The rest, as they say, is Dr WHO’s history, science and geometry…

* There is a clue to Doctor’s forgotten surname in the very first episode, The Unhappy Childhood: on the junk shop gates a sign declares: ‘I’m Foreman’.

I complain that Chris Chibnall screwed up the Timeless Child idea, so I’m putting my money where my mouth is, and giving my thoughts on how another approach might have worked a bit better.

For the record, it’s not that the very concept of the Timeless Child is totally unthinkable or impossible. After all, Philip Hinchcliffe, Robert Holmes, and those gang of pranksters loaded up The Brain of Morbius with an in-joke of putting mysterious extra faces on a screen in addition to Hartnell, Troughton, Pertwee, and Baker.

Is it really a shock that some 5 year old watching it was mesmerized by it? That he’d imprint on it?

At the same time, totally ignore the obvious possibility that those extra faces were Morbius’? The fact that he’d eventually be a future showrunner who’d blow it all up exponentially was admittedly a curve though.

I’ve long held the belief that you can do any story — as long as it’s done well. Execution is all. That being said, let’s take a little trip over to a different time track. Imagine if the different elements of the Timeless Child were presented a bit differently, with a different showrunner. This would be taking a different direction at the fork in the road when writing the script.

It all begins and ends with Fugitive of the Judoon. I’ve said before that this is my favourite of the entire Chibnall/Jodie Whittaker era. The fact the Vinay Patel was the co-credited writer probably has a lot to do with it. Another bonus: this episode is basically the Jo Martin era all in one go, and she’s a very good Doctor, outshining Jodie throughout. 

For this alternate path, the episode would play out exactly the same, until we hit the grave site scene, where we diverge. 

The Doctor’s sonic is picking up incredible readings inside the grave. She digs until she unearths the edge of a generic, cylindrical TARDIS. Hearing a voice behind her, she spins around to face “Ruth” in full costume, looking calm, confident, and holding a large weapon. She begins to introduce herself, “Hello, I’m…”  We cut away to an aerial shot, with thunder rumbling, and when we return, the Doctor says that that was a Gallfreyan name — checks to confirm Ruth’s biology with the sonic, only to find out that not only is Ruth a Time Lord, they are the same Time Lord. The Doctor’s stunned, but Ruth’s settled and determined.

They teleport into Martin’s TARDIS, and from there, things run along similar paths as in the episode — we see the confrontation with Gant run its course. After departing, instead of Martin being severely annoyed and ditching Jodie at the next stop, they have an actual heart to heart conversation, where Jodie shows a bit of compassion with her curiosity, while Martin softens a bit. After all, she remembers losing Lee, as well as going on the run in the first place, her human life, and she still wants nothing to do with Division anymore.

She slumps down a bit over the TARDIS console. She feels so old. Ancient. Older than the stars. And she’s tired of the violence. The Doctor tries to comfort her, telling her there is another way. Having resigned herself that Ruth is in the Doctor’s past. The Doctor realises that because of the time differential, Martin won’t remember this meeting at all. Probably not, says Martin. But Martin hits a few controls and the Doctor, in proximity to the psychic circuits on the console, rocks back a bit, stunned. The Doctor’s dropped off, not realising Martin hit her with a remote mind-wipe, and later is found sleeping on a park bench by “the fam”. Her memory of almost everything having to do with Ruth has faded. The TARDIS crew move along to maybe very different stories filling out the rest of Series 12.

Back in Martin’s TARDIS, she knows she can’t go on like this. She needs a fresh start. Not as a human though. She’ll never do that again. The blonde was annoying, but she wasn’t wrong about changing her ways. She decides to go back to the one place Division won’t look. Gallifrey. As her memory of the strange blonde in braces begins to fade, she decides to bring out the chameleon arch again, but this time, to make a different change. A new name, a new Gallifreyan life, a new start. 

Immortality became a curse millions of years ago. A strain… A burden she no longer wanted any part of, so she’ll become someone else. Someone hopeful. Someone who can care again. Someone who’ll walk a different path. At least whoever she becomes will have a chance. 

Sometime later, a small child is found outside the walls of Arcadia and taken in. 

It’s many, many years later when the grown man chooses his path with a name. A name to help and heal. Never cruel, never cowardly. He decides he’ll be not a warrior, but a Doctor. This is where his life truly begins.

Many years later still, he and his granddaughter steal a TARDIS and escape.

Now that’s a rough outline, but I feel it would have been more acceptable to the audience at large. Possibly still divisive, but maybe not as much. In essence, yes, the Doctor had this existence before the Hartnell incarnation for billions of years, doing God knows what, and possibly some unspeakable things, but the headline here would be that this Time Lord remade themselves and only when they decided to change, only then, would they begin again with the Hartnell incarnation and truly become the Doctor. 

You could easily rationalise this path, see how it could work with a “Timeless Child” scenario, because here, Hartnell truly would be the first Doctor. A lot cleaner, I feel. The Thirteenth Doctor finds a TARDIS in the grave, not hers and Ruth may be her but with a different name, not the Doctor. 

The separation there, I think, is important. If the character reinvents themself, effectively starting fresh with a self-imposed type of “witness relocation protection” program that even they don’t know about, it gives the actual Doctor his own beginning, separate from everything that had gone before: a clean break, instead of the confusing, irreconcilable bramble of questions originally presented.

Now, dear reader, instead of what we actually got, would this scenario have been more acceptable?  

Time. Space. Reality. It’s much more than a linear path; it’s a prism of infinite possibilities. Can you explore these new realities and face the unknown? Dare you ponder the question: What If? [Yes, okay, we might’ve got that bit from Marvel’s What If?, but we’re sure you get the idea…]

Imagine it’s Saturday teatime, March 1985. The Sixth Doctor and his companion Peri have just left a jungle planet where the Doctor has had to face off against a mad computer with a god complex. They now find themselves in a Sandminer on an unnamed planet full of creepy robots. When crewmembers begin to die, the newcomers are immediately suspected. But the Doctor has another theory: what if it were the robots that were doing the killing? And just who is Taren Capel?

The following passages have been found in the fall out of the Time War along with a number of scrolls which have fallen through a rift in space. The scrolls feature the ever changing Doctor in a number of adventures. In this unknown universe they have been chronicled by a mysterious author called Terrance Dicks. These are the surviving fragments. Welcome to Storm Mine 6…

Fragment One

Peri crept cautiously into the Commander’s cabin and looked around. The robots carrying the body had disappeared into another room, the door closing behind them. Peri had waited for a while, then when nothing happened, she’d gone looking for the Doctor — without success. Now, remembering the Doctor’s words, she had returned to the Commander’s office, hoping that her friend would be there. Of course, as she had suspected, the Doctor was nowhere in sight, but there was a curtained sleeping alcove on the other side of the room. And the curtain moved. Peri moved silently towards it. “Doctor?” she called. “Doctor, there is something going on here — I found a dead body.”

There was no sound from behind the curtain, so Peri inched closer. “Two robots picked up the body and took it away…” Peri sprang then, pulling the curtain back but it wasn’t the face of the Doctor she saw. It was a corpse. She screamed.

The man was kneeling on the bunk, his face contorted by death-agony into a leering mask. As Peri watched, covering her mouth to stop another scream, the body toppled forwards towards her. She leapt back and heard movement behind her. Spinning around, she saw a robot reaching out for her. She screamed again but before she could move, one silver hand flashed out and gripped her arm while another covered her mouth.

“Please do not call out,” it called out in a calm, emotionless voice. “It is important that I am not found here.”

Peri twisted her head aside, out of its grip. “Obviously!”

Releasing Peri’s arm, the robot moved forward and inspected the body. “If I had killed him, would I not now kill you too?”

Peri watched on wearily. “That still doesn’t explain what you’re doing here.”

“You still haven’t explained what you are doing here.”

“I was looking for the Doctor –” Peri broke off, suddenly finding a little courage. “I don’t have to explain myself to you; you’re just a robot.”

The robot held up the dead body’s hand. On the back sat a red disk. “Do you know what this is?”

“No.”

The robot rose. “I must ask that you tell no one about me,” it said calmly, and moved towards the door.

Peri moved out of the way, “Is there anyone left alive to tell?” She braved a glance at the dead body.

Then the door slid open and the robot gripped her by both arms. Peri struggled but to no avail. A bearded thin-faced man in elaborate robes walked through the open door, stopping at the sight of the robot and its captive. “So, we’ve finally caught one, have we?” Then he saw the body sprawled face down on the bunk. “Not soon enough though!” He stepped forward and slapped Peri across the face. That was a mistake. Peri’s arms might have been held tight but her feet were free; she lashed out with one and caught Uvanov in the pit of the stomach. He staggered backwards gasping for breath.

“I didn’t kill that man!” Peri screeched. “Ask this thing!”

Uvanov stood up and looked at the robot behind her, “You’ll have to do better than that!” He rubbed his stomach tenderly. “Who the hell are you?”

“My name is Peri. Peri Brown. Who are you?”

“Why did you kill Cass?”

“I didn’t.”

Uvanov felt the need to strike her again but thought better of it. “Why did you kill him?”

“Aren’t you listening? I told you I didn’t.” Peri looked over her shoulder, “Ask this thing!”

Uvanov looked at the robot. “That is D.84. A single function labour robot. D-class. D for Dum. It doesn’t speak.”

“Has anyone bothered to tell it that?” Peri queried.

“You’ve killed two of my people, costing me and the company a great deal of money — can you think of any good reason why I shouldn’t have you executed on the spot?”

“No. But you can; otherwise, you’d have done it!”

Uvanov moved closer again. “Don’t get clever with me!”

Fragment Two

Poul led the Doctor and Peri into the crewroom. “You two wait here. I’ll go and get the others. If you’re right about this, you can’t imagine what it will mean!”

“What do you mean, I can’t imagine?” the Doctor huffed indignantly. “Of course I can imagine; this isn’t the only robot-dependant society in the galaxy.”

There was a buzz from a communicator and Poul hurried over to it. The voice of Toos came from the speaker.

“Poul, Zilda just came over the command speaker and accused Uvanov of being the killer. You’d better get over to his quarters as fast as you can. He left control like a scale 20 storm!”

“I’m on my way. Stay here, you two.” Poul dashed from the room.

Peri shrugged and looked at the Doctor, wondering if they should follow. He shook his head. “Sit down, Peri. Whatever’s happening has happened by now, and I’ve got to think.” He sunk onto a couch. “What was it you called those robots?”

“I said they were creepy!”

The Doctor hung his head. “You know, people never loose that feeling of unease about robots. The more of them there are, the greater unease and, of course, the greater the dependence. It’s a vicious circle. People can’t live with robots or exist without them.”

“So, what happens if the strangler really is a robot?” Peri asked.

The Doctor threw his hands into the pockets of his multi-coloured coat. “Oh Peri, I should imagine it’s the end of this civilisation…”

Fragment Three

The Doctor and his party hadn’t gone very far before they heard movement coming towards them.

“Robots,” whispered Peri. “Lots of them!”

They ducked down behind a storage hopper and waited. Silver-booted feet marched by, a whole line of them, and passed on into the darkness, heading for the control deck.

The Doctor stood up, “All robots?”

Peri nodded. “From what I saw,”

“Strange. I would have expected Taren Capel to be along for the kill.” He shrugged. “Come on you two; we’ve got to hurry.”

The Doctor led the others to the mortuary section with the revolving racks of deactivated robots. “Right D.84, I’ve got a job for you. You remember the storeroom where Chub kept his equipment?”

“Yes.”

“You’ll find some gas-cylinders there. Fetch me one please, as quickly as you can.”

“That will be a pleasure,” D.84 said politely as he moved away.

The Doctor opened a door and spun the rack to reveal the deactivated robot body of V.2. He pulled a machine from his pocket and began to detach the robot’s head.

Peri had spotted its hands. “Look!” She gasped. The metal hand was smeared with dried blood.

The Doctor pulled the head free and lifted it clear of the body. “Borg’s blood, I’d guess — he was the only one strong enough to put up a fight. Poul saw that and it trigged his collapse.”

Peri nodded, remembering the sight of Poul’s rigid body and wide open eyes. “Doctor, what is robophobia?”

The Doctor was sat cross-legged now, looking like a multi-coloured garden gnome. He had taken off the back of V.2’s head and was pulling out its robotic brain. “Robophobia, an unreasoning fear of robots. Nearly all living creatures use non-verbal signals, body movement, eye contact, facial expressions.”

Peri knelt down next to him. “Body language?”

“Exactly. These robots are humanoid, presumably to make you humans feel more comfortable with them. But at the same time, they don’t give off those signals. It’s rather like being surrounded by walking, talking dead men.”

“That’s what Poul said.”

Now, the Doctor had taken out the robot brain and communicator and seemed to be combining them into one entirely new piece of equipment. “The lack of signals undermines a certain type of personality. It produces identity crisis, paranoia, personality disintegration, and then finally, robophobia.” He began fitting the modified communicator back into its case and checking it over.

“What are you doing, Doctor?” Peri asked, exasperated.

“I’m trying to patch this communicator into Dask’s private command circuit to make a deactivator.”

“Dask?”

The Doctor nodded. “Otherwise known as Taren Capel. You see, I’ve discovered the way he’s modified the brains of his killer robots. If this thing works, it’ll produce a robotic brainstorm.” The Doctor heard a zap and removed his singed fingers. “Peri, do you have to talk so much?”

Peri just rolled her eyes.

Fragment Four

Painfully sucking in air through a bruised windpipe, the Doctor recovered to see a grotesque, distorted face hovering above him. Was it a man or a robot? Muzzily, he recognised Dask, in his robotic face paint. “Hello Dask,” he whispered. “Or should I say Taren Capel?”

“I’m glad you have recovered, Doctor.”

“Oh really? Why?”

“You’ve come very close to ruining my plan. It is fitting that I should make you suffer for that.”

Behind the wall panel, Peri crouched, waiting. If Dask tried to kill the Doctor, she would burst out of the panel and try for a final attack. Better to go down fighting than cowering in an alcove with a canister of air which sat beside her, slowly hissing away.

D.84 twitched and began to stir, his brain severely damaged, but he was not yet completely deactivated. The Doctor’s deactivator had rolled closely to his hand. D.84 knew what he must do. With agonising slowness, he inched his hand closer to the device.

Out of the corner of his eye, the Doctor could see what was happening, but didn’t want Dask to notice too. “I suppose you’re one of those boring maniacs who needs to gloat? You’re going to tell me your plans for running the universe? Or how you’ll turn Peri into your robotic bride?”

Dask put the probe to its lowest setting and switched it on. A low and sinister hum filled the room. “No Doctor, I’m just going to burn out your brain. Very, very slowly.” He advanced towards the table.

Peri gripped the gas cannister to use as a weapon the minute she sprung out of the alcove.

D.84 found the deactivator just beyond his reach; he struggled to slide his paralysed body forward.

Dask leaned forward with the probe in his hand.

“Dask! Dask!” The Doctor said mockingly. “You look ridiculous in that outfit. You’re not half the robot your father was!”

That insult struck home. It was the absence of any kind of parental love, the upbringing at the emotionless hands of robots that had turned Dask’s brain. And fashion tips from this strange man?! He lunged forward with the probe which connected to the Doctor’s head for a fraction of a second. The glow sizzled round the Doctor’s head for a moment and he writhed in sudden agony. Slowly, he composed himself. “Looing your calm, Dask? That’s not very robotic of you. It was your verbal and physical precision that gave you away…”

“No surprise, Doctor. I was brought up by robots, brought up as a superior being. In time, I grew to realise that my robot brothers should live as free beings rather than slaves to worthless humans!” Dask spat bitterly.

Despite his situation, the Doctor looked at Dask with genuine pity. It was easy to see what had gone wrong: Dask had transferred his love from his absent parents to the robots around him, ending up identifying with them completely, taking their side against the human race.

The Doctor gripped the end of the probe, trying to push it away, “Robots would have no reason to exist without people — can’t you see that?”

“No!” Dask shouted. “I shall free them; I shall programme them with the ambition to rule the universe!”

But there was something wrong with his voice.

D.84’s hand closed around the deactivator. From where he was lying, he could just see the Doctor. “Goodbye, my friend,” he whispered and pressed the firing stud. There was a thud and D.84’s head exploded. So did the head of V.6, standing over the Doctor, showering him in sparks.

Dask was too shocked to move for a moment, then he switched the probe to full and lunged for the Doctor again. The Doctor dodged and grabbed Dask’s wrists, desperate to keep the probe from his head. Maddened with rage, Dask was almost as strong as one of his robots. Peri was trying to push the panel down to get out of the alcove and help, but it wouldn’t budge.

SV7 entered the room, “Kills the humans. I must kill the humans!”

Dask called over: “Help me, SV7.” He was holding the Doctor down in a robot-like grip.

It had taken a long time, but the helium from the gas canister was finally high enough at last. Dask’s voice came out as a strangled squeak. The altered voice meant nothing to SV7 — it wasn’t Taren Capel’s voice, but that of any other human.

Dask backed away. “No, not me, you fool! Kill the Doctor! I am your controller, I am Taren Capel!” SV7 broke Dask’s neck, the snap echoing around the room. The Doctor could do nothing but look on as SV7 almost pulled the head off his former master.

Dropping the lifeless body to the floor, SV7 turned on Uvanov and Toos who had just entered the room. “Kill the humans!”

Uvanov circled with a blaster pack in hand, but with a sudden change in direction, SV7 advanced towards Toos and grabbed her neck. She let out a scream. The Doctor finally managed to unstrap himself from the table and leapt forward, probe in hand. He jammed it into the back of SV7’s head. SV7 let go of Toos, who dropped to the ground gasping for air.

“Kill… Kill… Kill the humans… Kill… Ki…” SV7 crashed to the ground — a dead man, no longer walking.

The Doctor drew a deep breath. “All good things must come to an end.”

“Will somebody let me out?!” Peri’s voice squeaked from the closed alcove.

The Doctor let out a chuckle. “Well, well, well, a mouse in the wainscoting. Well squeaked mouse!” He took out a screwdriver and began to unscrew the wall panel.

We do, of course, owe a debt to the late, great, and much-missed Chris Boucher, original writer of The Robots of Death — surely one of the greatest Doctor Who adventures (no matter which incarnation of the Doctor found trouble on Kaldor!).

It was 13 years ago when The Eleventh Hour first aired, but also three years since the DWC published my fan fiction prequel How the Doctor Lost His Jacket to coincide with the Series 5 opener’s 10th anniversary (and the #FishCustard lockdown watchalong, organised by Emily Cook). So today, I am pleased to announce that an audiobook version of the story was released at midnight (a reference to Prisoner Zero), read and produced by yours truly!

To accompany my first ever fan audio project, I have also compiled a PDF digital booklet with updates to the original story and Writer’s Notes detailing the production process, plus lavishing cover artwork by Owen/@WhovianLife and many more surprises.

The Eleventh Hour, of course, was the first full episode featuring Matt Smith as the Eleventh Doctor, although he’d appeared in the last scene of the previous story, The End of Time (by Russell T Davies), a small segment written by then-new showrunner, Steven Moffat. Between those scenes, the Doctor would lose his iconic jacket, as worn by David Tennant as the Tenth Doctor. My story explores what happened to it!

Matt would stay on until The Time of the Doctor (2013), while Moffat continued as showrunner until Twice Upon A Time (2017).

“My main starting point for The Ghost Monument was finding out that humans can survive unaided in deep space for up to 12 minutes,” Chris Chibnail and I, then-showrunner of Doctor Who revealed to Psychics Monthly, the magazine for physicists who can’t spell. “I think I learned that in a dream, but it’s definitely true and if you ever get the chance to go into space without a spacesuit, any breathing equipment, or protection whatsoever, I advise you to do so. I’ve been. Again, in a dream, but I’m sure that’s fine.”

(Our lawyers have advised us to note that you should, under no circumstances, do this. You know, in case NASA rocks up at your door and asks for you to go on an experimental mission around the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter wearing only your pyjamas and some discount crocs from Asda.)

This scene, with the Doctor and her new possible-reluctant-companions, possible-kidnapped-victims floating in the wildness of space, proved to be not only a great opener for The Ghost Monument but also a shocking cliffhanger for Jodie Whittaker’s debut episode, The Woman Who Fell Down to the Planet Below Her, By Heck. Fortunately, Chris consulted several astrophysicists (well, two of them) to confirm that the characters could be saved from their potentially-grisly deaths in space if a spaceship were passing by at just the right time; and further that space is absolutely full of spaceships. “You can hardly move for spaceships,” said an unnamed source who goes under the pseudonym Mr C. Chibnail and I.

The Ghost Monument found the Doctor, Officer Yasmin Khan PCDA QVC AOL, O’Graham O’Brien, and Ryan on the desolate planet called Desolation which was pretty darn desolated and was located in a desolate part of space in this desolate universe, as they competed in a race to reach the titular Ghostly Monument. “I bet it’s the TARDIS,” said numerous commenters, fans, casual viewers, blind nuns, Gary Barlow, and a woman called June who works in the Cardiff branch of Lego. “I bet it’s the TARDIS too,” said Chris Chibnail and I.

And though some select viewers had already guessed what said Ghostly Monument would turn out to be, the production team had a secret surprise concealed up their metaphorical sleeves: killer toilet paper.

“I think everyone has, at one point in their lives, thought, ‘what if I go to the bathroom and after casting out my unmentionables, I reach out to grasp the toilet paper and instead of cleaning up after my ablutions, it starts to strangle me and I start screaming and yelling for help but no words leave my lips because the Andrex is that triple-ply sort?’” Chris told Psychiatrists Weekly, the weighty tome for psychics who can’t spell. “So I thought I’d channel those nightmares into Doctor Who.”

The showrunner’s dreams, night terrors, and psychotic episodes further inspired the rest of the story. Those fears include: a desert; some water; solar-power; some tunnels; a self-lighting cigar; and Art Malik in a tent.

“It was pretty high-octane stuff,” one doped-out anonymous viewer told Points of View from his cell.

Though sentient loo roll wasn’t a great challenge for the design team to realise, they had their work cut out for them when it came to creating SniperBots, described in the script as “camouflaged robots, head-to-toe in khaki, wearing hoodies, one arm replaced by a massive gun, and their face a black box with one shining bright eye in the centre, like Cyclops from the X-Men”.

“When we first saw the word ‘SniperBot’ in the script,” explained Supervising Art Director, Dafydd Shurmer, in the November 2018 issue of In Vogue, a magazine dedicated to reporting about what was in the previous month’s issue of Vogue, “I thought they’d be so far away, we wouldn’t need to design them. You never see snipers up close, right? They’re always like… over there. In the distance. So I thought we could just do a silhouette or something. Maybe a plank of wood with a face drawn on it in Sharpie. Sadly, Chris was worried the audience would confuse them with Ryan, so instead, we simply designed the SniperBots as camouflaged robots, head-to-toe in khaki, wearing hoodies, one arm replaced by a massive gun, and their face a black box with one shining bright eye in the centre, like Cyclops from the X-Men.”

“I wasn’t happy with the design,” Chibnail and I later complained in an episode of Open Air. “Totally not what I’d envisioned.”

That would be the only controversial thing in The Ghost Monument. On a completely unrelated topic, the episode also featured the first mention of the Timeless Children.

The Ghost Monument further gave the series one of its most iconic images, courtesy of guest star, Shaun Dooley. The image showed the silhouette of Jodie’s Doctor against a dazzling sky, the TARDIS in sight, with fresh new adventures beckoning and a whole universe of wonder ready to be discovered. “I was trying to take a selfie, but got my phone the wrong way round,” Dooley told everyone who would listen.

Whittaker was especially pleased with it and asked him to send it to Chibnail and I. She told Nightly Northern News for the Northern Nation: “ey up, ey up, eyy upp. Eyyy ooop, ey up, ey oop, eyy uppp, whippets, ey up.” The picture was then used on the steelbook version of Series 11.

“I wasn’t happy with the design,” Chibnail and I later complained in an episode of Open Air. “Totally not what I’d envisioned.”

At the conclusion of the episode, the Doctor got back to her TARDIS, only to be surprised with a new interior design. After throwing up for numerous hours, seeing a therapist for six weekly sessions, and writing letters of complaint to the BBC, the Doctor realised that this was still her TARDIS and, epzo facto, was charged with getting it off Desolation. “I was very happy with the design,” Chibnail and I said in an issue of Physicists Daily, the newspaper for psychiatrists who can spell but have delusions of grandeur. “Totally what I’d envisioned.”

And so, with a new title sequence, new TARDIS trio made up of four people, a new direction, a new costume, a new showrunner, and Bradley Walsh, Series 11 was off to a refreshing start. In the coming weeks, Doctor Who would teach viewers that racism is bad, spiders are bad, things that eat too much are bad, dying is bad, Amazon is bad, sexism is bad, child abuse is surprisingly forgivable, and revenge is bad.

‘Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house

Something was stirring that frightened the mouse…

The stockings were hung by the chimney with care

While something arrived that shouldn’t be there.

The children upstairs were nestled, all snug in their beds

With visions of Mrs. Baddeley’s plum pudding danced in their heads.

Mamma in her sheath and Papa in his cap

Had settled their brains for a long winter nap

When out in the hall, there arose such a clatter

Papa sprang from his bed to see what was the matter.

Away to the stairs he went in a flash

To see a girl on the landing, with a coat made of badges and her hair tied with a sash

Outside, the moon glowed on the newly fallen snow

While downstairs, something glowed brightly on the tree and the presents below

A man before Papa’s wandering eyes appeared

Dressed in gold and surrounding him a light so bright that everything else seemed to disappear.

The girl moved so quick

Papa knew this wasn’t St. Nick

More rapid than eagles, his powers they came

As he bellowed orders, the girl called out his name;

“Light, stop this now!”

He looked up, “No. You shall all bow”

As tendrils of lightening dashed away across the vast hall

Papa heard the girl call

“Go! Get away, you all must get away, you-all,”

As a wind blew through the house like a hurricane flies

The girl fell back, hitting her head and there she lies

Up the stairs, Light flew

Papa knows he doesn’t have a sleigh full of toys, but his children might think he’s St Nick too

Then there was a twinkling sound that seemed to come from all around

The girl, her consciousness she found

It’s not reindeer with their little hooves

Clattering around on the roofs

As Papa drew his head and turned around

Up the staircase the girl was abound

Light looked at her, like she was something small underfoot

Where the lightning had struck her, her clothes were tarnished with burns and soot

A bundle of a device she had assembled from her pocket

Light let loose another lightning strike, which left his fingers with the power of a rocket

His eyes – oh how they twinkled! His smile, how merry!

His cheeks burnt red like roses, his nose like a cherry!

The girl, however, her face stern, her mouth clamped shut like a bow,

The device began to glow as white as the snow

She clenched her teeth,

The energy from the device threw itself around Light, wrapping around him like a wreath

His face had been so broad and jolly

But he then realised his folly

His powers drained from him then

And Papa couldn’t help but laugh when

In the time it takes to blink

Light had no time to think

Papa turned his head

The girl gave him a knowing nod, Light dissipated and vanished; there was nothing left to dread.

In the still dark, she spoke not a word; instead turning to her work

She gave a dial on the device a little jerk

Looking at Papa, she patted the side of her nose,

Giving a final nod, out the door she flows

Papa sprang down the stairs, but before he could call after her,

Only motorbike headlights in the distance told him; she’s a blur.

But Papa heard her exclaim as she drove out of sight –

“Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good night!”

“I am The Watcher. I am your guide through these vast new realities. Follow me and dare to face the unknown, and ponder the question, ‘What if’…?”

Leonardo da Vinci was a man ahead of his time. CENTURIES ahead of his time.

We can talk about his art of course. His collection of Mona Lisas, etc (although only one’s real).

Perhaps his revolutionary, groundbreaking work studying human anatomy, making discoveries about human organs, including how the heart works with blood flow, well before anyone else. Indeed, he was the first human to sketch many human organs.

He, more than anyone else, knew humans inside and out.

But I think maybe some need a reminder about his prowess at invention.

As concepts go, he first conceived the use of concentrated solar power, the calculator, theorized plate tectonics, and much more.

He conceptualized the tank, over 400 years before its creation. In modern times, a team built said tank to his design specs. This war machine had over 30 gun placements and was completely operational. They only had to change one single gear, which was thought to have been specifically placed as a red herring by da Vinci to thwart anyone who might try and steal his designs.

He was a pioneer in robotics. His sketches and schematics for what has become known as “Leonardo’s Mechanical Knight” were utilised and the creation built in 2002 by NASA personnel. It worked. 

He designed a workable precursor to the modern diving suit. 

He conceptualized the parachute, glider, helicopter, and landing gear.

He discovered the processes governing friction.

He designed the first self propelled machine — an early ancestor to the automobile.

It’s said that many of his designs were lost over time, or at least never rediscovered, so it’s difficult to know what we’re missing. But here’s a man who had an instinctive knowledge of science, the human condition, could conceive of the inner workings of fantastic inventions centuries before their actual creation.

These conceptualisations of the tank, diving suit, weapons, submarine, helicopter, numerous machines such as the lens grinder, all these sketches and designs — those were things that could in some way be explained to some of the higher thinkers of his time. They certainly made sense in the modern era, where our tech finally caught up with da Vinci. These were things we recognised.

But what about the concepts that were deemed pure fantasy back in Leonardo’s day? That are still deemed an intriguing impossibility today? This was a man who could create anything. Who’s to say he didn’t have other, more fantastic plans?

Did Leonardo da Vinci, using his incredible and instinctive knowledge of science, combined with his innate ability to create amazingly complex machines, build the very first time machine? 

And if this fantastic creation is hurtling through time — PERHAPS AS WE SPEAK — would Leonardo come to the here and now and be… the new showrunner for Doctor Who?!?!?!

No, of course not.

1. He’d want to direct or be director of photography or something similar.

And 2. He’s going to far more interesting places.

Besides, the job’s a hassle. 

But it’s fun to think about!

So what if anyone in time and space could be the new showrunner? Who would you pick? Who is in charge of Doctor Who somewhere in this vast multiverse?

Set between School Reunion and Invasion of the Bane.

“You’re a good dog, K9.” 

“Affirmative.” 

She closed the cabinet and gave a loud sigh, not knowing when her best friend would return home. Sarah Jane spent a few minutes wandering around her attic, before discovering a box containing a pile of some old pictures. The first was a photograph of Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart in uniform.

“Well, here we go again.” She recalled the Brigadier’s remarks from when they witnessed the Doctor regenerating into his fourth body. From dandy to all teeth and curls. 

The memories of her time at UNIT were a delightful addition to her career as a journalist. Not just assisting them on various missions, but also using her expertise to foil plots spearheaded by corrupt officials or aliens. These experiences were nonetheless excruciating at times, especially when she had no choice but to investigate alone and get caught in the middle of a conspiracy. Despite having some misgivings, Sarah chose to honour her relationship with the organisation by keeping in contact with the Brigadier; even to this day. 

She put the photo aside before noticing another familiar face. Her fellow traveller Harry Sullivan. That nickname “old girl”, he often called her, would nowadays be considered patronising and sexist, but it didn’t really bother her too much. Harry did good as a surgeon – for his friends, colleagues, and others in need. 

“Oh, Harry,” she chuckled, “You really were a twit.” 

The next photo was of a young woman in a wheelchair, a friend very dear to Sarah who was like a daughter to her. 

“Natalie Redfern, it’s been a while.” 

The last time she saw Natalie was many months after being rescued by NASA. They had coffee in Ealing Broadway, where Sarah first heard about the new headmaster at Deffry Vale High School – Mr Finch. She thanked Nat and gave her a lift home in her silver Volkswagen Passat estate. 

“Well,” Sarah began, reviewing each photo, “I think it’s time to hang them up.” 

And so she did, to accompany the framed one of herself with K9 Mark III. She couldn’t forget her old friends, including the Doctor. It was only the beginning of a new life. Working alone.

In memory of the wonderful Elisabeth Sladen, who passed away 10 years ago today.

Author’s note: the following is offered in a spirit of fun and is intended, like Vorg’s Scoop, to amuse – simply to amuse. It isn’t meant to be taken too seriously and is certainly not meant to sneer at those who, perfectly legitimately, enjoy Chris Chibnall’s era of Doctor Who. We’re all enriched by our different opinions, after all.

I just wondered what it might have been like if Chris Chibnall, rather than Verity Lambert, had helmed the early Doctor Who stories.

Here’s what some of them might have looked like…

An Unearthly Child

Schoolteachers Ian and Barbara are worried about one of their pupils, Susan, who isn’t doing too well with her homework. They track her home through the fog to a junkyard in Totter’s Lane, Shoreditch. There, they find a police box and a mysterious stranger: a cheerful, bubbly lady who’s really pleased to see them and welcomes them to her nice junkyard. The stranger explains that she’s called the Doctor and has a time machine called a TARDIS and that she’s a Time Lord, well sort of, but she’s actually recently discovered she’s really the Timeless Child who’s lived for billions of years and has forgotten most of what she did until the last 2000 years or so. This explanation goes on for 10 minutes and the schoolteachers politely try not to look bored. The Doctor had overheard Barbara telling Ian to “use a match” to illuminate the gloom and surmises he must have matches to light cigarettes with; she tells him off for being a smoker and says it’s very, very bad to smoke and he’s setting a very, very bad example to the lovely young people he teaches. Reeling from the harangue, Ian craves a cigarette but he can’t because he’s left his Woodbines in the staff room. The Doctor is, though, very grateful to Ian and Barbara for their concern about Susan’s homework and says it’s very, very important that all children do their homework so that they can all do well at school and go on to live happy and fulfilled lives. (This last speech is delivered straight to camera.)

The Doctor invites Ian and Barbara to travel with her in time and space and they happily agree. They enter the TARDIS and the Doctor re-introduces them to her granddaughter. They travel to prehistoric Earth. The Doctor tells Za that he must be nice to Kal because Kal is from another tribe and is therefore a foreigner and that therefore they must all be nice to him because that would be nice.

The Doctor intervenes in the power struggle between Kal and Za and shows the tribe how to hold elections, based on the proportional representation single transferable vote system. After an entire episode of mucking about with different coloured pebbles being placed into hollowed out stones, Hur (who the Doctor campaigned for) is elected leader and an age of prosperity, with food and fire for all, follows. Ian is overjoyed when he is shown how to make fire by the Old Mother (who knew how to do it all along but wasn’t going to say because she doesn’t like how the men had all the power and got to make all the decisions). A sabre-toothed tiger tries to jump on Za but the Doctor intervenes, tickling it between its ears until it calms down and rolls over on its back so the Doctor can tickle its tummy. She tells the tribe they mustn’t kill and eat beautiful animals like this because they’re beautiful and animals and that animals have rights too, and she shows them which plants they should eat. The whole tribe eagerly embrace vegetarianism. The Doctor and her Fam depart in the TARDIS, but not before the Doctor has given Za a big hug.  

In return, Za has given her a big bunch of flowers from the Tribe’s local retailer, The Florist of Fear.

The Daleks

The pacifist Thals will not fight the Daleks, evil intelligences housed in metal casings. Ian tries to organise the Thals into a fighting force. The Doctor is aghast. How dare Ian impose his violent ideas on a peace-loving people? We must respect their viewpoint and never, never try to change anyone’s minds. “Good on you, chuck,” she tells Alydon when he explains his people will not fight the Daleks. The TARDIS crew beam seraphically on the Thals and the Doctor explains to the Fam that they have all learnt something new today: that violence never, ever pays. They wish the Thals all the very best and depart in the TARDIS.

However, the Daleks have by now worked out how to leave their city and they find the Thals and kill them all.

The Edge of Destruction

The Doctor is very cross with Susan when she goes mad and tries to attack Ian with a pair of scissors. She patiently explains to the dim teenager that we must all live in peace and that talking to someone and explaining your point of view calmly but assertively is much more productive than any attempted homicidal assault with domestic implements. The Doctor shows Susan how to use scissors in a much more productive way and the TARDIS Fam all sit down together to cut doilies out of pretty paper.

The Aztecs

The Doctor doesn’t want to stop the Aztec practice of human sacrifice because, as she explains, we must respect the Aztecs’ culture, that any deviation from moral relativism is always morally wrong (except when it is to condemn deviation from moral relativism), and that if the Aztecs believe that ripping people’s hearts out will make the sun rise tomorrow, then who are we to say this deeply held belief is incorrect?

However, the Doctor is worried that the practice of throwing the corpses of the recently mutilated off the top of the ziggurat will pollute the environment and might interfere with the delicate balance of the eco-system because pollution is very, very bad. So she distracts the Aztecs from carrying out any more sacrifices by organising a big party where they all sit down together and drink lots of yummy cocoa. A distraught Tlotoxl bursts into tears at this moving scene. The Doctor persuades the Aztecs to elect Cameca as the new High Priest of Sacrifice and everyone lives happily ever after.

The Reign of Terror

The Doctor and her Fam arrive in France during the Revolution. The Doctor applauds the spirit of the Revolution because it will make the lot of the oppressed in France much, much better, and she explains to the Fam how the guillotine is actually a measure designed to improve human rights because it is much more humane than previous methods of capital punishment as it was designed to end life instantaneously. But capital punishment is very, very naughty and should be abolished. The Doctor’s rousing speech gives great comfort to Barbara and Susan and they remember it when they’re in a tumbril on the way to the guillotine.

The Doctor patiently explains to the Fam, too, that there are lots of other good things about the Revolution, especially as it got rid of the monarchy, and the concept of a monarchy is very, very bad because it’s very, very bad that people should live lives of privilege based simply on who their family was rather than on the enlightened principle of a meritocracy where talent will always win out, as we know it always will.

The TARDIS food machine has run out of bread and the Doctor explains that’s all right as it will let them eat cake instead.

The Dalek Invasion of Earth

The Doctor is thrilled to meet Dortman, a scientist confined to a wheelchair, and she patiently explains to him that disabled people are just as good as everybody else, and he shouldn’t stop trying to be a scientist just because he is in a wheelchair. Dortman tells her a) to stop patronising him and b) that no amount of wittering will help defeat the Daleks. The Doctor sulks for the rest of the episode.

The Doctor realises the true extent of the Daleks’ villainy when she learns that their dehumanised human slaves are called Robomen. She goes down to the River Thames by Hammersmith Bridge, where the Daleks like to go sub-aqua diving. A Dalek has just emerged from its daily swim and she patiently explains to it that women are just as capable as men to be reduced to zombies and that the Daleks should make sure that at least 50% of their recruits are women and that they should call their slaves “Robopersons” instead. The dripping but enraged Dalek fires its gun at her and she runs away.

The Doctor meets the Slyther, the Daleks’ pet from their home planet, who snacks on human slave workers. Having made friends with the Slyther, the Doctor leads it by the paw to the lush patches of stinging nettles that grow in abundance in the Dalek labour camp. The Slyther tucks in to the tasty vegetation and decides it likes the taste better than humans and anyway, it doesn’t have to spit the buttons out afterwards. So, there is no need to chuck the Slyther down a mine shaft, which was Ian’s preferred scheme.

When the Daleks decide to blow up half of London with a Dalekanium bomb, the Doctor calls on the help of her cute friend the Pting, who she has brought with her in the TARDIS from another world. The Pting gobbles up the bomb, which then explodes in his stomach and makes him a bit fatter when it goes off. Then the Pting burps and everybody laughs and laughs.

The Daleks realise they are no match for the Doctor and fly their ships back to Skaro, vowing to develop temporal technology so they can pursue the Doctor and her Fam through all of time and space and finally have their revenge.

The Web Planet

The Doctor will not allow the Menoptra to pursue their terrorist campaign against the Zarbi because terrorism is very, very bad and although the Zarbi are insects, we must respect all life. She entices the Zarbi into a big room and locks them all in together, where they will live out their natural lives in peace. When Ian points out this means they will either starve to death or eat each other, she scowls and doesn’t talk to him again for the rest of the story.

But of course, this opens up other parallel worlds in which Douglas Adams wrote for the Second Doctor, Robert Holmes introduced us to the Eleventh Doctor, and Steven Moffat helmed an American reboot in 1996. What other tales from the multiverse would you like to glimpse?