9th Doctor (con't)

 
‘So what is this place?’ asked the Doctor casually. ‘Underground bunker?’

‘High security zone,’ the leader said casually. ‘This continent is officially uninhabited, and the nearest settlement is around fifty thousand kilometres away.’

‘Is it?’ the time traveler asked innocently. ‘I just trusted to my ship’s intuition.’

‘You mean your flight computer malfunctioned?’ one of the other Thals asked, curious.

‘Something like that,’ the Doctor replied vaguely. If any of the Thals had noticed the TARDIS, they certainly hadn’t recognized the strange blue box as the mythical transport of ancient legends – assuming the ancient legends existed. ‘So what’s all the security for? Are you in some sort of trouble?’

‘We shouldn’t be discussing restricted information with intruders,’ said the leader, though clearly she was enjoying having someone new to talk to. ‘Suffice it to say, important people work here. Even if you really are just a lost tourist, you’re in a lot of trouble trespassing here.’

‘Story of my life,’ the Doctor shrugged. ‘Or at least a strong recurring narrative theme, anyway.’

* * *

‘Once I see the face-mask I can work out exactly who’s tomb with a view we’re in, like reading the inscription of a grave stone. We’re not going to disturb anything here or steal anything…’

‘Even though we could,’ said Adam, examining the masks and necklaces on display near the carriage. ‘Purest gold, absolutely priceless…’

The Doctor, face aghast, turned to look at him. ‘Excuse me,’ he said in a low, sharp voice. ‘Are you suggesting we pawn this stuff at some twenty-first century auction website?’

‘Well, couldn’t we?’ Adam retorted. ‘Just the gold plate on this wood would pay off America’s gross national debt! And no one knows we’re here, no one would know if we took anything. It wouldn’t change history, would it? The archaeologists would just think it was tomb-robbers…’

‘It would be tomb-robbers!’ snapped the Doctor. ‘That’s precisely what we’d be doing! The only difference between that and digging up a grave to help yourself the corpse’s pockets is you’d be using my TARDIS – and that’s not on. We do not loot history! Rose, tell him!’

Rose tore her gaze from the shadows. ‘Yeah, the Doctor’s right. Whoever’s buried here, they were a living person and they’re entitled to rest in peace…’

‘Until the archaeologists and the other tomb-raiders do it,’ Adam retorted. ‘It’s already happened, this stuff is going to be stolen. Why shouldn’t we help ourselves?’

* * *

Rose realized that they were in some kind of pub, and Captain Jack was looking through binoculars at the blackboards on the walls, with the drinks scrawled in chalk. ‘I think I’ll order… it.’

‘“It?”’ echoed the Doctor, unimpressed.

‘As in “all of”,’ Jack explained. ‘Everything.’

‘Well, you’re paying,’ said Rose, having to yell to be heard.

Captain Jack delved into his jacket pocket and took out what appeared to be single pound coin. As he held it out, Rose saw the coin had become a diamond-like gem. ‘It’s a mesomorphic rock, should cover the costs. Don’t spend it all at once, though.’

‘Those,’ said the Doctor in a smug, holier-than-thou voice, ‘are illegal tender in seven galaxies. Including this one. The staff have probably been taught how to spot it.’

‘Yeah, but given it takes four hours minimum to be sure, and given how packed this place is, I think they’ll take it,’ Captain Jack retorted. ‘Besides, who would suspect a pretty girl with brown eyes?’

‘Never been to an estate, then,’ Rose replied, then began to struggle her way through the crowd over to the bar.

* * *

‘Still, someone’s alive,’ said Rose, trying to stay cheerful. She called into the darkness. ‘Hello?’

‘Hello?’ came the faint response. It was Rose’s voice.

‘You were right about the echo,’ Rose told Jack.

‘An echo,’ said the Doctor, joining them at the doorway. ‘Or a mimic.’ He pulled a slim pen-torch from his pocket and shone it down the corridor ahead. The corridor was quite messy compared to the one they’d just left; rather than neat arrangements of organized plants, flowering vines and thick foliage spilled over onto the floor, or tangled and matted themselves on the walls and ceilings despite the lack of any trellises.

The passageway was deserted.

‘Maybe it was a trick of the, well, not light,’ Rose mused. ‘But noise.’

‘The quiet playing tricks?’ The Doctor didn’t sound convinced. ‘Come on, let’s start with the new seedlings section. There must have been someone there when the emergency happened. Bound to be clues.’

‘Did this distress call have any details?’ asked Jack as they moved down the corridor.

‘Nope,’ said the Doctor unhelpfully. ‘Just three words in no particular order.’

‘SOS?’ Rose guessed.

‘Somebody Help Me,’ the Doctor replied.

* * *

The voice that had filled their minds spoke once again. We are affecting your retinas so you can see us, that is correct. We have no true forms, no physical bodies, for you to perceive or find comfort in.

‘What are they?’ asked Jack, his voice unusually hushed. Like Rose, he felt like he was in the presence of something that should be shown deference. ‘Some kind of electromagnetic radiation?’

‘Something like that, yeah,’ said the Doctor, completely unimpressed.

We are composed of electrical energy, the basic raw existence of which all primal matter is composed. There is no need to fear us, the voice went on. All participants’ physical needs are supplied, and no harm comes to anyone. They came from their own spheres of their own free will to yield their minds to us. You yourselves are not in any discomfort or pain?

‘No,’ Rose admitted.

‘But we didn’t come here of our own free will,’ Jack added.

Your vessel arrived in our complex, the voice replied. We did not bring it here.

‘Could be a malfunction,’ the Doctor conceded. ‘Could be anything. But why do you need to do any of this? Why do you need to do a massive census survey on at least five million species in that one corridor?’

We require their input, said the voice. It obviously didn’t feel like giving any more detail.

‘You’re recording everything in their brains,’ Jack said. ‘That’s a lot of input.’

It is required, the voice repeated.

‘Why?’ Rose challenged.

The explanation is both long and complicated.

‘Then talk quickly and use simple words,’ the Doctor retorted.

* * *

Six novellas set in the universe of the Ninth Doctor, featuring enemies and friends old and new. In a universe changed top-to-bottom by the Time War, does the Last of the Time Lords still have a place in this new order? Given options to reclaim the past or embrace the future, the Doctor will depend on his companions more than ever before - but will they be up to the challenge?

Coming soon from Nigel Verkoff Publishing

a subsidiary of the Order of St. Macka the Usurper Inc...

Stubborn As Ever

Doctor WHO

The TARDIS whirls thorugh time and space carrying Dr. Who and Clara to an unknown destination. Suddenly the strange vehicle begins to materialize beneath a rocky over-hang...

Doctor: We've come to rest on the edge of a jungle, Clara! Och, it wouldn't take much to bring that rocky over-hang crashing down on the TARDIS!
Clara: Nah, it's probably been sticking out like that for a thousand years...

ED'S NOTE: Do not think about what might happen next if you don't want to ruin the surprise!

Clara: Besides, the TARDIS is indestructible, isn't it?
Doctor: Oh yeah, so it is. I dunno what strange foreboding came over me.
Clara: It's probably nothing! Let's explore the jungle!

But on a nearby planet, others have spotted the vulnerable position of the TARDIS...

Mire 1: Our enemies have left their space vehicle in a dangerous place... Send a rocket to disturb the mountainside!
Mire 2: YES!! Let it be done!
Mire 1: Jeez, what a drama queen.

Soon a Mire pilot is over the area, streaking a powerful missile into the mighty crag...

Missile: WHUMPH!
Rocky outcrop: KERAAK! RUMBLE!
TARDIS: Oh for fuck's sake...

Meanwhile, a little way into the jungle...

Clara: What on earth?
Doctor: Are we on earth?
Clara: It's an expression.
Doctor: Pretty crap expression.
Clara: I was referring to that "Whumph! Keraak! Rumble!" sound and wondering what it could pordent?
Doctor: Well, obviously that rocky overhang, the one you insisted couldn't possible come crashing down on the TARDIS, has come crashing down on the TARDIS! It's buried under tons of rock... what caused this disaster?
Clara: That plane had something to do with it!
Doctor: What plane? Not more 9-11 anti-terrorism soapbox rhetoric, Clara, it's getting old!

Then suddenly...

Clara: A FLYING SAUCER?!?
Doctor: Make your mind up, Clara! Plane, flying saucer, flying saucer, plane...
Clara: Okay, it's definitely a flying saucer.
Doctor: You know, you're normally more blaze about these sort of things, given you were jaded and cynical after being through my entire timestream.
Clara: I was trying something new.
Doctor: What? Not being utterly annoying?
Clara: Don't worry, you can pick up the slack, you whiny emo fuckwit. Now, what do we make of this convenient flying saucer burying the TARDIS?
Doctor: It's all part of a plot, Clara...
Clara: Oh, we've got a plot this week have we?
Doctor: Indeed we do, you maladorous bitch-whore. Quick, head for the jungle!

The flying saucer burns itself a landing area out of the equatorial forest below.

Mire 1: A clearing will soon be prepared... Stand by to land!

Later...

Doctor: One of my adversaries has planned our doom... first they sabotage the TARDIS, now they hunt us in a flying saucer!
Clara: ...it has to be the Mire!
Doctor: The Mire? Not the Daleks or the Cybermen or the Sontarans or the Ice Warriors or even some random aliens in alliance with Missy, but the MIRE?

A few hundred yards behind, the Mire are making startling progress.

Mire 1: Clear the way with your rays! The space travellers cannot be far away!

Mire guns: ZZZBB! ZZZZZBB!

Doctor: Oh, lucky guess, Clara!
Clara: It's hopeless with only bare hands against this undergrowth!
Doctor: I fear you're right, Clara... The Mire must be almost on top of us!
Clara: What makes you say that?
Doctor: Well, they're standing right behind us.
Clara: Ah. Shit.

Mire 2: THERE! Up ahead... I have seen our prey!
Mire 1: Total fricken drama queen!
Mire 2: Show them no m-e-r-c-y! D-E-S-T-R-O-Y THEM!

Mire guns: FLASH!
Tree:  KR-A-AK!

Doctor: Make a sprint for it, Clara... We'll have to hide. We can't out-run them!
Clara: It's no good, Doctor... The Mire are right behind us!
Doctor: I know! I told you that, you dim tart!

A little later...

Mire 2: Our enemies appear to have escaped... Find them!
Mire 1: Where did they go? There is only that tree right in front of us? The tree we just blew up!
Mire 2: Their deviousness knows no bounds!

Crouched hiding halfway up that same tree, the space travelers are aware only of the danger below... not of the threat from above...

Leopard: RRRAH!
Doctor: By the planets... a leopard!
Clara: It'll give us away!
Doctor: Let's give this dangerous pet to the Mire! While the Mire deal with the leopard, we'll slip away!
Clara: I always thought you cared about dumb animals.
Doctor: I do, which is why I haven't thrown you to the Mire yet.
Clara: Oh piss off you maladorous pervert.

The Doctor pulls down the overhanging branch and the big cat tumbles down towards the hideous robots below...

Leopard falling out of tree into Mire: THUD!
Leopard: RAWG!
Mire 1: Kill the strange creature! D-e-s-t-r-o-y it!
Mire 3: But it's so cute!
Mire 1: Let's tickle its tummy. Prrr!

The Doctor and Clara swing away on jungle vines...

Doctor: I think they've found their spirit animal.
Clara: A brain-damaged predator with constipation?
Doctor: Seems obvious in retrospect, doesn't it?

Next week Dr. Who and Clara make an action-packed stand against the power of the Mire... Don't miss the thrills of the dramatic outcome next week!

An Overview of Twelfth Doctor

"I think it's going to be a whopper," the Eleventh Doctor predicts of his upcoming regeneration and he hardly undersells it. Although the problem of the regeneration limit is hand-waved by a puff of golden pixie dust, the long term emotional and psychological implications are definitely not glossed over and define the Twelfth Doctor from his opening episode to his final scene as the most troubled, unhappy and yet fundamentally honest of incarnations.

The first thing we know about the Twelfth Doctor is that the Eleventh Doctor had no faith in him: unlike every other regeneration where both outcoming and incoming Doctors tend to wing the entire transformation, the Eleventh goes to great lengths to take precautions. He immediately assumes his replacement will alienate Clara and calls ahead to beg her to help his future self out of pity; he sets the TARDIS to take his new self straight to the Paternoster Gang to look after him; and he deliberately patterns his new face on Lucius Caecilius to remind him to save lives and help people. Alas, the Eleventh Doctor is proved right to be wary - the Twelfth Doctor immediately alienates Clara, nearly gets himself killed without Vastra's help and even fails to remember why he has his current face and, immediately upon working out the reason, makes one of the biggest mistakes of his entire life.

Part of Clara's initial mistrust of the Doctor is down to how the Eleventh Doctor prepares her for the change. Although he is facing regeneration with dignity and a reasonably-positive spin, he is quick to emphasize that the Doctor who is coming is not him and that everything Clara knew of as the Doctor would vanish like breath on a mirror. Even his phone call to her significantly has him speak of his future self as a stranger, a separate individual who is not the man in the bow-tie. The Twelfth Doctor is the one to insist they are the same, but the Eleventh Doctor clearly did not share that belief.


But why the Eleventh Doctor has so little confidence in his future self? The answer lies in the fact he didn't want there to be a future self. The Time of the Doctor showed him fully accepting his inevitable death for at least seven centuries of the siege of Trenzalore. It was Clara, not the Doctor, who begged the Time Lords for a new life cycle after all. Having exceeded his natural life span, the Doctor has lost any moral high ground over villains like Davros or the Master who have refused to accept their time was over. Although he makes light of this hypocrisy at times (he claims his entire incarnation is a "clerical error" in Before the Flood), his unhappiness at still being alive doesn't take much to find. "Immortality isn't living forever," he tells Clara in The Girl Who Died. "That's not what it feels like. Immortality is everybody else dying."

The idea of another dozen lives ahead of him holds next to no appeal; he is willing to sacrifice regenerations on the flimsiest of pretexts in The Witch's Familiar and Extremis, he recklessly puts himself in needless fatal danger in Listen, and while all Doctors have been willing to risk their lives to save the day this incarnation at times appears to be looking for an excuse to put himself in the firing lines. He throws himself to the monsters like the Teller, the Foretold, the Dream-Crabs, while later he goes out of his way to get himself killed defeating Davros, Harmony Shoal, the Monks, or the Cybermen. Nardole himself fears the Doctor's reckless suicidal streak, which started long before he was heartbroken after the death of River Song. In his final moments, the Doctor tells Testimony he has no desire to survive, regeneration or not: "A life this long, do you understand what it is? It's a battlefield, like this one, and it's empty. Because everyone else has fallen."

Not only does an extended lifespan not appeal to this Doctor, but the existential angst following a regeneration seems worse than ever. The Doctor always seems uncertain of what a regeneration is, always claiming he is the preceding man in a new body but that his replacement will be an entirely different person yet this Doctor is the first to be unsure if he is the same individual at all. Although he just saved all the children of Gallifrey and defended Trenzalore for a thousand years, the Twelfth Doctor claims none of the credit or put it forward as proof he is intrinsically "good". In his first episode, he clearly realizes he has much more in common with the Half-Face Man than he'd like - they are both beings who have been rebuilt so often nothing of the original remains except an ideal that justifies their behavior. Is there anything of the real Doctor left in the Twelfth Doctor?

The Doctor himself doesn't seem so confident. Although his previous incarnation started to believe "the Doctor" was a sort of code of conduct he had chosen to follow, the Twelfth Doctor describes it as nothing more than a role he is more often than not unfit to play. As he says to Davros, "On a good day, if I try very hard, I'm not some old Time Lord who ran away. I'm the Doctor." Later, when enraged with Ashildr, he warns her: "The Doctor is no longer here! You are stuck with me!"

Perhaps it's part of his uncertainty following regeneration, or perhaps the fact after a thousand years of acting as Trenzalore's sheriff, but the renegade Time Lord now considers himself a separate individual to the hero of all time and space. Like Robin Hood, he is impersonating a legend that's simply too good to be true, but unlike Robin Hood the Doctor doesn't feel up to the job. "I can't be the Doctor all the time," he tells Clara in their last adventure together and pointedly it's his "Doctor-y" behavior that alarms his original self more than simply being embarrassing with sunglasses and a guitar. "Who the hell do you think you are?" the First Doctor gasps, unable to accept anything of himself could act in such a way. "I am the Doctor. Who you are, I cannot begin to imagine!"

Yet while the Doctor has doubts about his identity, no one else does. Vastra, UNIT, Davros, the Time Lords, the Sisterhood of Karn, and especially River Song and Missy never doubt that this is the same man. Yet despite this constant reassurance of who he is, the Doctor still doubts - almost certainly because his new self not being the Doctor has some appeal. People constantly expecting him to behave in a certain manner, do things in a specific way and always remain on a pedestal clearly rubs him up the wrong way and he almost instinctively from his first appearance struggles to do what people are not expecting.

Throughout Deep Breath, Clara and the Paternoster Gang guess his motives and predict his actions and he impulsively does the opposite; give him a murder to investigate and he'll wander the streets doing nothing, a daring rescue and he'll run away, an urgent deadline and he'll sit down and drink some whisky. His contrariness becomes a dominant feature as he disagrees with everything and everyone, even though he's inevitably wrong about things: he's the first to dismiss a good Dalek, Robin Hood or Danny Pink as what they appear yet comes up with elaborate fantasies about invisible aliens, evil trees and even sinister conspirators manipulating them.

Yet it's clearly not simply a stubborn desire to disappoint that leads to his appalling behavior of his first year. Although his thoughtless brutal honesty is a core part of his personality, and he's just as unflattering about himself as everyone else, he goes out of his way to deliberately offend and upset people from the get-go. The Doctor has never had much time for the military mind - indeed, it's suggested that all Time Lords have scorn for soldiers as the lowest of the low - but the Twelfth Doctor takes it to a new level. He scorns Journey Blue for daring to mourn her dead brother, sneers at Danny Pink for ever having seen military service, and delights in mocking UNIT for its attempts to actually stop Cybermen just as he had no sympathy for Morgan's men fighting and dying to hold back the Daleks. In The Zygon Inversion, he addresses the fact that none of the aforementioned warriors - nor even the extremist Zygons - have committed any crimes on the levels of his own atrocities in the Time War. So his hatred for soldiers fighting monsters is not that they are bad people or doing bad things, but more that they remind him he has done much, much worse. His sudden palpable disgust of spending time with soldiers would be the height of hypocrisy were the Doctor not to have stated in his opening episode that he intends to stop making the mistakes he once did. When he turns aside Journey's plea to be a companion - the same plea, word for word, Leela made to him in The Face of Evil - it's comparable to a reformed alcoholic turning down the offer of a drink. Traveling with soldiers was something, he has decided, he should not have done.

However, his distaste for soldiers turns into outright prejudice and bigotry when it comes to Danny Pink. Although his initial "can't retain that" spiel does appear to be an act (in context of the scene, he is trying to get Danny to leave him alone so he can speak with Clara), it quickly becomes clear he doesn't like the man even though he has retired from soldiering and started educating children with mathematics, just like the Brigadier did. His previous career, his ruining of the Doctor's plan and also his courtship of Clara combine to make the Doctor outright hate Danny Pink, especially as Danny is the first to note the Doctor's anti-soldier stance is borne of self-loathing. It's not hard to imagine the Doctor dislikes Danny because he reminds the Time Lord of himself - a learned man who has nonetheless spent far too much time fighting wars. We also learn that Danny, while undoubted a good man, is also suffering intense post-traumatic trauma, anger issues and guilt over the death of children.


The Twelfth Doctor's no-more-mister-nice-guy approach is a deliberate performance, albeit one he might actually enjoy. If he truly thought soldiers were unworthy of life, he wouldn't save Journey and return her home, yet his horrible treatment of her will ensure she won't befriend him. For this is a Doctor who believes he needs to be alone, that he should not have friends. Consider the Eleventh Doctor, whose spirit was almost totally broken by losing Amy and Rory - people he barely knew for a decade - compared to watching generations on Trenzalore grow old die for a thousand years straight. After so much heartache, the Doctor has decided (as he did in The Snowman) to keep the universe at arm's length. He's more uncomfortable and awkward around Journey, Robin Hood and Perkins when it seems they might actually enjoy his company and befriend him. The Twelfth Doctor is desperate to leave right away and will even "delete" people from his memory rather let them linger. From the moment that his "big sexy woman" dinosaur dies screaming in agony, the Doctor would rather be alone and hated than lose someone.

Of course, the fundamental core of the Doctor is that he cares about other people. "Is it so hard to credit that a man born into wealth and privilege should find the plight of the oppressed and weak too much to bear until one night he is moved to steal a TARDIS, fly among the stars, fighting the good fight?" wonders Robin Hood. For all his apparent callousness, the Doctor's gut instinct is still to do the right thing - from diving to save Danny from the Skovox Blitzer, to risking his relationship with Ashildr to spare Sam the Swift, all the way to saving a nameless World War One soldier from pointless death. His compassion betrays him from the very start, finding it all too easy to sympathize with a serial killing cyborg, the endless plight of the Foretold, or even the potential redemption of Davros and the Master. "Hardly anything is evil," he muses, appropriately enough given his continual encounters with malfunctioning tech with the Clockwork Robots, Skovox Blitzer, the Foretold, the Pilot and the Vardy. He's quick to defend non-evil threats like the Teller, the creature hatching from the moon, the Dream-Crabs, the giant fish in the Thames and he gives the benefit of the doubt to the Boneless as long as he can.


The Doctor first doubted he was a good man when he hesitated to help Rusty the Dalek, as if anything less than one hundred per cent moral certainty was unacceptable. Given he had spent a thousand years fighting a morally-black-and-white war where his every enemy had publicly decided to murder civilians and commit genocide, it's not surprising the Doctor found it difficult at first deal with moral complexity like a good Dalek. Similarly, after a thousand years of crazy schemes like wooden Cybermen and see-through Sontarans, he expects conspiracies and subtexts where there are none - he is nearly defeated by the Clockwork Droids and the Sheriff of Nottingham simply by them doing exactly what they appear to be and not carrying out a cunning bluff, while he mistakes the magical forests for evil. Unsurprisingly he finds himself relying on what certainties he can find, and it's only when he accepts that he is an idiot who doesn't know anything that he is able to start managing to save the day instead of quite often endangering it. Adding to his anxiety is the fact a lot of the nasty adventures are his fault: his survival lead to Missy's masterplan with Cybermen and cyborgs, his quest for the hidden creatures affected Danny's life for the worse, the TARDIS summoned the Boneless, his presence drew out the Dream-Crabs. In short, if the Eleventh Doctor was right and the Twelfth's anger is born of shame and fear, there's a lot of it about.


The biggest change between the Twelfth Doctor and his predecessors is that he starts his life without the deep-rooted survivor's guilt of the Time War hanging over him. As the War Doctor noted, his successors overcompensated for this with their childish good humor. Without that prompt, the Twelfth Doctor has no desire to be good company (and valid reasons not to). Yet this changes forever when he abandons young Davros on the battlefield in The Magician's Apprentice. It is an act of utter, unforgivable cowardice - especially given there was no reason not to think it was a completely different Skaroine boy who just happened to have the same name - and the Twelfth Doctor is never the same again. Having completely failed to be "the Doctor", his sudden predilection for sillyness, guitar-playing, sonic-shades and baggy trousers shows he is, like the last three Doctors, retreating into childishness to deal with the guilt. As Clara says, "This isn't you!"

"I spent all day yesterday in a bow tie, the day before in a long scarf," replies the Doctor, justifying his sudden hoodie and baggy check trousers, eager to connect back to his past incarnations than emphasize his current "failed" one. Although he does go back and save Davros, the fact is the Doctor never intended to show that mercy and even at the end of The Witch's Familiar, neither Missy nor Clara have learned what caused his sudden shameful change of character. Nor does he abandon his new easygoing persona; his "minimalist" uptight suit and short haircut were to emphasize who the new Doctor was now, presumably to deal with his post-regeneration uncertainty. Post-Davros, the Doctor is more eager to soften the edges, let his hair grow, hide his eyes with sunglasses and embrace people so they don't have to look in his face.

Yet, even though he'd abandons his outer vileness, he still falls prey to the one thing he was trying not to do - get his hearts broken. He initially treats Clara with a mixture of respect and contempt, constantly bowing to her judgement but continually mocking her appearance and arrogance, but his obsession with her returns all too soon. He keeps her at arm's length for his first two episodes, but by Dark Water pledges undying loyalty to her after she's revealed herself as a manipulative liar who used everything she knew about the Doctor against him. By focusing all his love onto Clara, by abandoning any other friends he might have, the Doctor rapidly sets himself up for a fall. Even as it becomes obvious their travels together are borderline driving her to insanity, he is reluctant to put up more than a vague gesture of concern. When she does finally die, her loss is combined with the fact that she was trying to be "the Doctor" in saving others. In short, the Doctor feels entirely responsible for her death in a way no other companion has made him feel and his attempts to stunt his emotions virtually destroy him.

It's hinted that Face the Raven is the last time we actually see the real Doctor and that from Heaven Sent onwards we are dealing with a clone of a cone, the real Doctor having died four and a half billion years ago. Certainly, given the Doctor's heartbreak, death wish and other emotional issues it's not hard to believe he willingly killed himself knowing someone else would be "the Doctor" and take his place. Either way, the Doctor's actions are telling. He puts himself through hell in every sense, driving himself to insanity rather than come to terms with his loss. Ironically, once this Doctor has gone bad he is the most likable and charismatic he has been so far. There is a reason for his cruelty and cowardice, for who truly hasn't wanted to get their loved ones back?

But his good humor is superficial, a front to show the Doctor has actually betrayed his promise to Clara and turned bad as a result of her death. Ohila is the one to note that the Doctor's apparently-worthy actions of defeating Rassilon and saving Clara are born of nothing but selfishness and spite. His aim is to absolve himself of blame for Clara's death, not bring her back. His plan is to wipe her mind and abandon her somewhere to live an obscure life, which as Clara notes is not the act of someone who cares how she feels. The Twelfth Doctor, so sick of having to be "the Doctor" ultimately manages to become the villain of his own show, murdering unarmed allies and plotting the total destruction of the entire universe. At the start of the story arc, the Doctor impulsively saved Ashildr by granting her immortality but was quick to realize "I was angry. I was emotional. Just possibly, I have made a terrible mistake."


Clara's initial relationship with the Doctor got off to the wrong foot when she joined him out of promising the Eleventh Doctor rather than the Twelfth proving himself to her. Similarly, her neural block solution robs the Doctor of the lesson he learned. "I went too far. I broke all my own rules," he mutters, but the whole thing is reduced to the level of a vague dream, easily-forgotten. When we next see the Doctor in The Husbands of River Song, he's sulky, miserable and eager to start a fight with total strangers. Has he also lost the memory of Danny Pink knocking some sense into him?

When the Doctor insists Danny should embrace his hellish existence because "without the capacity for pain, we can't feel the hurt we inflict," Danny counters that if the Doctor is aware of how much his behavior hurts people, he has no excuse to carry it out. The Doctor thus gets to learn that lesson all over again as he sees just how much emotional pain he has put River through, and his decision to actually be a married couple with her - instead of a variety of intense one-night stands - gives him a slightly better learning curve with relationships than with Clara. Ironically, the self-styled psychopath has a healthier mindset than Clara ever did, and gives the Doctor the strength to confront their love's true obstacle: his hatred of endings. He tells River that "every Christmas is last Christmas", accepting their time is finite - but the first time those words were said to him, by a seemingly-dying Clara, he became absolutely obsessed with stopping it ending.

After 24 years on Darillium (though we should note the Doctor reminds River that they weren't necessarily stuck with just that) the Doctor has again learned to love and also to lose, very appropriate since his first episode showed him unable to remember the events of The Girl in the Fireplace when he achieved both. Yet the loose end he faces after River heads off for her final fate brings back the weary nihilism that so haunted his first days. He's outlived all his friends, he loses everyone whether he admits he likes them or not. He's descended to a low ebb when he agrees to finally kill Missy and make sure she stays dead. This depression was something River foresaw and through Nardole she is able to restore the Doctor's hope - if Missy can be redeemed, then it's worth saving her and staying alive no matter what the difficulties.

For if there is one thing unique to the Twelfth Doctor is that he is not happy his day job is saving the universe. While many an incarnation might grumble at not being able to have holiday now and again, this Doctor resents the lifestyle he has inherited. He clearly has no real interest in the "designated days out" he is obliged to offer Clara, and spends most of his free time in the TARDIS console room rather than exploring or having adventures. He dislikes Clara's perception of him being a hero who "stops bad things happening every day" and when in Last Christmas she asks him to stay to defeat any leftover Dream Crabs, he compares the request to dealing with polar bears. "Am I supposed to do something about that, too? I'm the Doctor, not your mam!" he spits angrily.


In Heaven Sent, when we're given a unique view into the Doctor's mind palace he endures a moment of despair and breakdown unlike any incarnation seen before. "I can't keep doing this, Clara! I can't! Why is it always me? Why is it never anybody else's turn? It's not fair! Clara, it's just not fair! Why can't I just lose?" Notably it is Clara, not any conscience or impulse of his own that convinces him not to give up. Once he assumes guarding the vault, he's able to promise Grant "I'll take care of anything that comes up," but it's hard said with enthusiasm. Although seeing Bill again, his first proper companion not inherited from the Eleventh Doctor, invigorates him and rekindles his desire to see the universe, it is all too easily broken.

The Doctor certainly seems happier in one place and one time than any other to be imagined. He's exiled himself to twentieth century Earth entirely by choice, to a place and time which doesn't challenge his expectations or ask him to save the day (since his previous incarnations are already doing it). He's effectively retired and at the start of The Pilot is taking his duty seriously enough that Nardole doesn't need to scold him once. Bill is probably the latest in a long line of students, but the first one to be "companion-worthy" and lure him into resuming his old life. Of course, the Twelfth Doctor has to be one of the unluckiest on record. Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong from accidentally making children immortal superheroes to causing massive alien invasions, and his attempts to provide Bill with easy and fun-loving adventures rapidly falter and she suffers more hurt, trauma and near-death experiences than Clara managed in her suicidally-reckless phase. Added to this is a return his earlier contrariness, where the Doctor's response to having a duty to guard the vault is repeatedly trying to get killed doing something else.


In one last big speech before his regeneration crisis, the Doctor finally admits he gains nothing from his duties of fighting monsters and saving people. He defines it as an inescapable duty, as inescapable as breathing. "I'm not trying to win. I'm not doing this because I want to beat someone. It's not because it's fun and God knows it's not because it's easy. It's not even because it works, because it hardly ever does. I do what I do, because it's right!" If the Doctor's job is defending the universe, it's a job he hates and wishes he could quit. He yearns for the kinder, happier times of meeting Robin Hood or defeating Space Vikings, but it comes as no surprise that he ends up facing his doom fighting a one-man war against an unstoppable enemy, the man who hates soldiers perishing on a battlefield.

Although his initial reluctance to regenerate in The Doctor Falls seem innocuous - he has good reason not to go through the change in the middle of a siege - it soon becomes clear that his death wish has grown. Having failed to keep Bill safe, having failed to redeem Missy, outlived River and forgotten Clara, the Doctor sees nothing but more pain and heartbreak ahead of him. Unlike the First Doctor, who is contemplating death rather than what regeneration might bring, the Twelfth Doctor is not afraid of the unknown. It is his knowledge that drives him to seek oblivion, screaming "I don't want to change again! Never again!"

We've seen him sacrifice himself in Heaven Sent and Extremis, but never before has his desire to simply end his life never been more acute. He desire is less to stay the same, as the Tenth Doctor, but not to start afresh and have to go through all these harsh lessons and painful truths all over again. Even the revelation that his lost companions live in on in Testimony does not change his mind, and he ends his life as he tried to from the beginning - alone in the TARDIS and free of the burden of being a hero: "The silly old universe, the more I save it, the more it needs saving. It's a treadmill!" Even the joy of remembering Clara and all their time together doesn't help, proving only to be a reminder of all his failures and losses.


The First Doctor accepts regeneration at last in the knowledge that if it is a kind of death, it is a death that ensures people like the Brigadier's grandfather Archie will be saved from certain death. It is thus selfless kindness that convinces him to go through with it and the same argument wins over the Twelfth Doctor. His last act is, as always, to give a brief and passionate lecture summing up all he has learnt so that the next Doctor will not have to learn it from scratch. The Eleventh Doctor dropped the Twelfth in the deep end, while the Twelfth gives the Thirteenth the same to do list he gave Clara. It is his final, maybe even his only true victory as the Thirteenth Doctor is born happy and eager to be the Doctor instead of wary, scared and unfit for the task.

Yet while the Twelfth Doctor initially appears the complete antithesis of the Eleventh, if we look back to the last minutes on Trenzalore we see the Doctor as an old, tired man ready for death but obliged to fight monsters, who has stopped making connections with the people he is saving (often nicknaming them) yet capable of a genuine smile when he sees Clara. In the TARDIS he is somber and still and prone to giving speeches as he thinks of earlier, happier times he will never get back.

Perhaps that was what caused all the trouble for the Twelfth Doctor? Not that his regeneration on Trenzalore was so massive, but that he simply didn't change enough...?

Thought for the Day

Single Fiction reviews (iv)

The Sixth Doctor Collection

In Their Nature (Simon Skupham) picks up right where The Twin Dilemma left off, meaning we get a story with the Sylvest twins as companions - so, please, contain your enthusiasm as best you are capable. This unique TARDIS crew arrive on a distant planet where some unlikable tourists are threatened by some generic toad-like slave traders before the local fauna kills all the bad guys. The regulars are vaguely sketched in, irrelevant and generic, so this is a perfect recreation of that particular period of Doctor Who.

The Twelve Doctors of Christmas: Six Geezers Laying In Wait (Steve Lake) shows this saga is still not flagging, with not only the clever title and plot revolving around half-a-dozen East End gangsters planning a smash and grab on Christmas Day. With this contemporary crime drama and the shoehorned appearance by the Master, this manages to evoke the brutal black comedy spirit of Season 22 quite well.

One lingering issue about The Enemy of the World, especially following its rediscovery is the question "Why is this the only time the Second Doctor has ever been mistaken for a world-famous dictator?" Salamander (Eric Bakke) flips it round and shows us a time the world-famous dictator has been mistaken for the Second Doctor, specifically by a bewildered post-Two Doctors Peri. At a cocktail party.

Renaissance of the Daleks (James Stewart) takes a similar approach to The Triumph of Axos by turning a happy ending to a TV story into a truly apocalyptic downer. Alas, Renaissance is rubbish and manages a variety of cardinal sins in its meager 1000 words - the Doctor and Davros are totally out of character, the continuity with Revelation is completely wrong, and the whole thing is a pointless attempt to do the Time War in 1986. Would Peri really be cheered to note the Doctor did absolutely nothing to avenge her death and simply waited for Davros and the Daleks to stupidly kill themselves after multiple genocide? James Stewart thinks so. Utter crap.

Nine Lives: Simple Life (Simon Skupham) is probably the best installment so far of the Nine Lives saga as it actually threatens to make a lick of sense. The basic plot of entitled tourists using lions in a nature reserve as target practice is actually more topically-relevant now than it was at the time, but again the sparse prose, in media res and unresolved runaround nature falls apart. If six different Doctors can't or won't solve the mystery, why should we care? It's not like anything's at stake.

Diplomatic Immunity (Mark Simpson) is a crossover with Babylon 5. Having actually watched this show, I can comment slightly more - and the regulars of both series are captured well, with the Sixth Doctor and G'Kar becoming friends far cleverer and fitting a development than you'd expect; both being antagonists who evolved at their end to become virtually-flawless heroes. The trouble is, of course, that the two franchises don't fit together at all. There's no room for the First Ones and the Time Lords, and getting the Daleks to cameo reminds us that we've already had this story before. Twice. With Jon Pertwee. On television. Still, points for effort.

The Last Knight (Simon Skupham) sees an appallingly-stupid and annoying Peri captured by knights on a medieval planet called Spitlok and the Doctor inexplicably going to her rescue. The fairytale storybook prose makes a nice change, as well as the linear narrative, but it's another "kill all the bad guys and leave" which I suppose maintains the Season 22 atmos if nothing else.

Forced Realities (Sarah Taplin) is an unfunny, plotless tale of the Doctor and Peri trying to get a VR machine to work but it doesn't. In the meantime, lots of ghastly pop culture references pad out the word count, such as "She picked out a book called ‘Notes from a mostly harmless small planet by Ford prefect’. Peri giggled. Why would anyone name himself after a car? She skimmed through the forward written by Arthur Dent (Human). Apparently this was the original version of Earths entry into The Guide. Peri made a mental note to ask the Doctor about this Guide." which has no relevance to the main story at all. Not that that would have improved it...

No Way Out (Simon Skupham) begins in the middle of an adventure with no interest explaining how we got here. The Doctor's in the condemned cell and Peri has been sentenced to hard labor by polishing bullets. Because there's a war on. Or something. And it's in a castle. I think. And the Doctor and Peri sod off to leave everyone to die. Yep, that's about right for a Skupham tale.

Kaye Redhead was clearly inspired by the Sixth Doctor/Peri line up and the cynical petty black comedy of Season 22 obviously appeals to her given this glut of stories (and even more of them on her own website). Brutal, tasteless, wisecrack filled vignettes are in turn overloaded with crossovers - Last of the Summer Wine, The Tomorrow People, Blackadder II in Arguably Alien, Thargon Gambit and Time respectively - or in the Master/Omega team up in Eye of Fire, gratuitous fanwank. The stories seem written entirely around snatches of dialogue the author liked, with plot, characterization and even clarification of what's happened thrown aside to the point it feels whole chunks of the story may or may not be missing. The sitcom arch-nemesis bitching of characters completely outstays its welcome but the novelty of viewpoints in the Doctor-lite Peri's Day Out and Despair and Desire show just how frustratingly good Redhead can write when there's even a vague point to the story in question.

A Change Of Art (Simon Skupham) wastes its first half with a kind of reverse Slipback as Peri gets drunk at a space bar, something that has no bearing on the rest of the story as the Doctor tells an artist to change his entire approach... because the Doctor read this happened in an art history book and must fulfill history. How thrilling. Still, no dark murderous ending, so that's nice.

All Too Soon (Eric Bakke) in a neat 1000-word conversation between the Doctor and Peri about their time in the comic strips with Frobisher, and specifically about how long it took for the Doctor to remember to come back for her. The answer, and the reasons for it, are a heartwarming look on their relationship - achieving far more than the next story, which attempts something similar and fails utterly.

The Grief (Mark Simpson) is, to be generous, a paragraph's worth of self-pity as the Doctor pauses between parts eight and nine of The Trial of a Time Lord to wallow over Peri's death. 250 words explaining that Peri dying is a bad thing and the Doctor feels bad. Utterly fails to evoke any sympathy for any character at all.

Mother Genralda (Steve Blair) is a bleak little tale where the Doctor gets a call for help he cannot accept, and the grim ending has a twist. Pity, as the idea could fill a whole novel, not just a brief Single Fiction.

An Unexpected Swim (Eric Bakke) is, um. Well. Sort of like that five-minute trip to Metebelis III from The Green Death, except it has the Sixth Doctor falling off an iceberg and going for, um, an unexpected swim. That's literally it, there's nothing else. Yet this is the story's strange allure - there must be more to this, surely? Mustn't there?

Shorter but vaguely more functional is the same author's Bad Side of the Moon where the Sixth Doctor witnesses a talentless prog rock musician and his sophisticated pet cat attempting to rip off Pink Floyd. The Doctor has better things to do and leaves immediately. After these thousand words, you can't help but agree with him.

Freedom of Choice (Paul Pollock) is a short, bittersweet glimpse of a Sixth Doctor/Cyberman adventure with a downbeat ending and doesn't waste any of its 894 words. A treatise on compassion, naivete, despair and maturity, it does more with both the Doctor and Cybermen in a few paragraphs more than the classic series ever achieved.

The Lucky Fess (Eric Bakke) is an extrapolation of the idea from DWM the Sixth Doctor used the TARDIS as a zoo to save endangered animals. Nice.

Jupiter Rising (Mark Simpson) gives us the sole appearance of Grant Markham in the Single Fictions. Not hard to see why. Lacking any interesting personality or extrapolating anything from his novel appearances, Grant is so bland it might as well have been a solo Doctor mission for this generic Silurian tale. Now, Diamond Dogs, there was a hard sci-fi story on the gas giants worth telling!

Invasion from Mars (by Mark Simpson) starts out as an attempt at a crossover with The War of the Worlds before revealing that the Doctor and Evelyn are stuck in the Land of Fiction again. Why Wells' Martians have to be fictional when Albert Steptoe, Sam Beckett, Randall and Hopkirk and the Vorlons count as "real" escapes me. It can only have been written so the author could claim to have done a tale with Evelyn Smythe, who is so generic and forgettable it's possible she was turned into fiction at some point already.

Dr. Smythe gets a better outing in the sixth Decade story Moon UNIT (by Mark Simpson) but that's really all that's good about the tale of Apollo 11 bringing back a Karnwassi egg - a xenomorph without the body horror, basically - that runs around killing hippies until drugs prove too much. Yeah, drugs are bad, you filthy hippies. Sheesh.

Time's Edge: The Parkesine Principle (Mark Simpson). Sigh. Flip. Autons. Jenny and Vastra. A plot that was done better in Industrial Evolution. Would Flip really understand the Uncanny Valley concept? Does she really seem like a Downton Abbey fan? Does anyone care about the history of plastic? Not I, sir. Not I.

The Ruins of War (Simon Skupham) is a shocking departure from the author's norm - there's a beginning, a middle and an end! Things are explained to the characters at the same time as the reader, the Doctor abhors violence and uses his wits to solve problems, and there's an uplifting ending. Was he ill? Either way, this interesting look at game theory, the Prisoner's Dilemma and the cycle of conflict is one of Skupham's best works.


The Peacemaker (Mark Simpson) gets off to a poor start with the Doctor and Mel bitching at each other about how boring the author's previous works have been - their words, not mine! - and gatecrash a possible peace treaty with the Sontarans and the Rutans which of course will never happen, because Lance Parkin already did that in The Infinity Doctors and anyway no one cares. The first episode's dramatic peak is the TARDIS crew having dinner for crying out aloud. Ironically had the aliens involved not been so infamous, the "downer" ending where peace talks fail might actually have had some clout. Sorry, Mel, but it seems your run of dull, formulaic stories isn't changing any time soon.

Fear Sphere (Simon Skupham) is, again, a surprisingly straightforward and easy-to-follow tale of a sideshow attraction in a space theme park threatening punters with their deepest fears. With some interesting characterization for Mel, including how her own travels have affected her, even the "call the cops" style ending feels right for once. There's no doubt about it, Six/Mel brings out the best in this writer.

Revenge of the Gastropods! or An Awkward Encounter or "The Worst Villain You've Ever Faced" (Frigata san Miguel) ends the Sixth Doctor's adventures with an outright comedy skit as the vengeful son of Mestor proves to be even more rubbish as a villain than his father. Add a hilariously rude Doctor and a gormless Mel not realizing she is being repeatedly beaten up for being annoying, and you've got a 1000-word farce it's hard not to enjoy.




The Seventh Doctor Collection

Season 24 appears to only appeal to Simon Skupham as he is the only author to tell tales of the Seventh Doctor and Mel. Arthur's Parabola's central concept - an innocuous shop on a ruined planet is actually an insidious death trap - means that the usual problems of brief descriptions, in media res and another "run away and let them die" ending aren't as bad as they are with his other work, and not nearly as frustrating as the Nine Lives series.

Temple Of Xzaniac, alas, doesn't quite get off quite as lightly.  There we have some unscrupulous archaeologists betraying the Doctor and Mel to gain favor with a mountain tribe who worship a god who's name rhymes with "Maniac" and every member's name starts with the letter Q and sounds like a duck farting. The efforts to deal with the topic of imperial colonialism are undermined by both white folk and tribesfolk being vicious, spiteful bastards and that the artifact they're after mysteriously kills people just as a mysterious pit kills people mysteriously. The Doctor refuses to explain anything to Mel, who doesn't question it, because he believes mysteries should stay mysterious. If this were a book, it'd be hurled across the room in disgust by now.

Death Ray (Simon Skupham) is an AU where Ray rather than Ace became the Doctor's new companion and their own take on Remembrance of the Daleks where things are decidedly smaller in scale. Ray's well-characterized and ironically more interesting and unpredictable than Ace would be in a given situation. The straightforward adaption of the TV story means the curt 1000-word limit doesn't render things totally incomprehensible.

The same writer's Enclosure is set right after Dragonfire and shows the Doctor and Ace's first adventure together in his usual stubborn and cryptic style. In this case they meet a highly-strung inventor with the unfortunate surname of Twaddle who is building a model replica of Brighton Beach for space criminals. At least the Doctor is too busy being cruel to Ace to murder him and so lets the authorities sort it out. Or something.

Spirit Guide (Terrence Keenan) seems the flipside to Mark Simpson's A Little Knowledge as the Fourth Doctor decides to manipulate, bully and generally ruin the Seventh Doctor's life for the greater good. Acting as liaison between Time Champion's different incarnations, we see the Fourth Doctor as a wannabe River Song as he sends the Seventh Doctor down his "Cartmel Masterplan" without spoiling any surprises. Charming, but not fun.

The Lines of Destiny (James Stewart) attempts to address the elephantine continuity problem of deciding just what happened to the Seventh Doctor and Ace after Survival with the straightforward answer that the Time War screwed everything up. In this case, the Cult of Skaro take pre-emptive moves against the Doctor by rewriting the order of Season 25 with the same implications of Faction Paradox, but at a 1000 words it at least doesn't outstay its welcome.

Tony Amis explores the Doctor and Ace's friendship in two brief vignettes. Momento sees the Doctor paralyzed by the big picture after destroying Skaro and Ace's impulsive, devil-may-care response is perfectly believable.

Similarly, A Day Like Any Other Day sees Ace pauses the start of another adventure to clarify her relationship with the Time Lord. Both stories are short and sweet.

The First Law (Mark Simpson) is a cliche-filled Frankenstein pastiche with the Doctor and Ace visiting a mad scientist and his lumbering servant in a castle on a dark and stormy night. Having Ace point out the cliches and then having the villain say they're there to make things all gothic is clearly a metatextual from Simpson who doesn't understand what it means. Clearly an early effort as even the characters are badly-done.

The Quelling (Kaye Redhead) is a bewilderingly-pointless tale of the Doctor and Ace walking into a cave, unwittingly awakening a Lovecraftian universe-swallowing Evil From Before The Dawn Of Time and then stopping it by smashing a Faberge egg or something. Utterly, totally meaningless in every respect.

Sunday Best (Simon Skupham) is very out of keeping for Skupham's usual style. The Doctor spends some time in Putney befriending a disillusioned vicar and Ace is impatient for the other shoe to drop and the inevitable Evil From The Dawn of Time to arrive. Although, as ever, the crucial plot moment occurs off screen and is only alluded to, the end result is one of the more mature and thought-provoking he's provided. And no one gets murdered.

Likewise, Bittersweet Deceit has the Doctor and Ace providing moral support to an ex-UNIT soldier who's tell-all expose is being rejected by the alien-disbelieving public rather than his stories of life on the front line. It's rather moving and sensitive, but the way the story cuts to the character's deathbed without explanation is bewildering. Was he doing his book tour from a hospital or a hotel? Pay attention!

Finally, Let's Pretend We Won A War is a parable of fake news and self-deceit as the Doctor and Ace discover an alien race lying to itself about its own history, despite the obvious dangers. The only real flaw is the Doctor not sticking round to get involved with the plot, but conceding defeat and leaving the ignorant and arrogant Malrians to their fate. True, the Doctor can't save everyone and solve every problem, but if he's not willing to at least try then what's the point in even writing about him, especially his most interventionist of incarnations?

Seventh Son (Kaye Redhead) is the first and last appearance of the "arch-villian Abass", a poor man's Heironymous from The Masque of Mandragora except he can summon rain instead of fire. After spending the first half of the story waiting for the Doctor to turn up and then grumbling the Time Lord is better at dealing with the titular chosen child than he is, Abass sets out to be a kind of more-successful Wile E Coyote laying booby traps for unsuspecting road-travelers before becoming an agent of the Black Guardian. I'm not sure we missed out much there.

The Print (Chris Pollard) is a grim tale of Neil Armstrong's legacy being wiped out by a resentful failed astronaut, but despite the good characterization of the Doctor and Ace they're really just there to have the plot explained to them. Short, bleak and more poignant now we've passed the year this story was set in.

Mindfade (Kaye Redhead) is a borderline AU, wherein Shou Young joins the Doctor and Ace aboard the TARDIS following the events of Battlefield. I quite liked this lineup, evoking the BF team-ups with Hex or Mel that allow a fresh look at the Doctor/Ace dynamic and would have liked to see more of the gang. Mindfade per se is Young's "initiative test" involving a brain-wiping virus ravaging an Earth colony in the future and Redhead's rapid turnover of plot, dwelling on random character moments or violence, remain as unsatisfying as ever.

In A Pickle (Mark Simpson) reveals the real reason the Doctor rebuilt his sonic screwdriver. Another of his "throwaway gags" that really don't merit this kind of word count.

Time's Edge: The Survivor (Mark Simpson) flings the Doctor, Ace and Hex against "old enemey" the Master in this bewildering semi-sequel to Dust Breeding. Although the characters are all well-drawn, it's clear the author has no real idea what do with them so instead we get a trip around Simpson's only wannabe-DS9 Marston's Planetoid (or "Planeroid" as it is here) with cameo by forgettable alien Kesk (he was in Season 6B's Prisoners of Wonshu). Amy disguised as a fortune teller to save the day from something the Seventh Doctor of all people should have been able to cope with emphasize that this multi-Doctor saga really has no actual justification.

The Twelve Doctors of Christmas: Seven, San Juan's Swimming! (Steve Lake) surely wins points for the title alone, as Agent Mark Seven of the Anti-Dalek Force teams up with the Doctor and Benny to save the flooded Tritonian city of San Juan from Daleks. A fun romp in the spirit of the 1970s Dalek Annuals and told in the first person, it's a pity that the TARDIS crew are sidelined by Terry Nation's characters. Perhaps crossovers like this should be avoided for every-Doctor sagas like this?

Overkill (Kaye Redhead) is another surreal comedy crossover, as Benny Summerfield and Vila Restal go to rehab and immediately break out. And Death's Head turns up. Quite funny and entertaining as long as you have no interest or respect in any franchise involved, and find alcoholics rejecting their friends' concerns hilarious.

Prime Target (Mark Simpson) is a straightforward and generic Zygon tale, with most of the focus being on the Doctor and his frustrating relationship with unfunny wisecracking loudmouth and general trollop Benny. Was Simpson finding the character hard to write? Did he just generally dislike her? If not, any reader would after her non-stop barrage of empty-headed sarcasm after this. JUST SHUT UP, BERNICE!!!

End of the World? (Kaye Redhead) is a brief tale of the Doctor and Benny preventing a post-apocalyptic medieval Earth from being invaded by the Great Intelligence and a single Yeti. The ideas are better than the application, but at least the regulars are properly-captured this time.

The Birds (Terrence Keenan) is just like that Alfred Hitchcock film. I mean, exactly like it. The only difference is that the Seventh Doctor, Ace and Benny are the ones threatened by the titular avians and there's slightly more discussion about what is causing the homicidal winged vengeance. It's quite good but... it's just The Birds. And generic NA angst. There's nothing new here at all, not even the bloody title!

Wait Until Tomorrow (Steve Lake) is a heavy-handed but forgivable sketch of the NA Doctor's nicer side, as he goes out of his way to help a wheelchair-bound teenage girl cope with the depression and stigma of being a cripple. A tale about embracing the joy of life can really stick out like a sore thumb in this gritty, dark era.

Cruise Liner to the Stars (Mark Simpson) is as the title indicates another doomed-passenger-filled-spaceship tale as the Doctor, Ace and Benny try to save lives without changing history. A cheerful and straightforward tale, it's still clear that the author is not comfortable with the NA regulars or their relations with each other. Can you imagine New Ace turning down a drink, Benny approving of mind-rape or the Doctor thinking "Damn! Why did Ace always have to be right?"

The Contest Continues (Charlie Day) is an overwrought and overwritten attempt at a New Adventure by someone who's never read Blood Harvest, which this contradicts completely when a depressed Doctor summons Romana from E-Space to help him fix the TARDIS. Tackling the ideas of Time Champions, using companions as chess pieces and all the usual stuff as though it had never occurred to anyone before, there's a kind of clueless charm about this. Day clearly put a lot of love and effort if not any actual research into this character piece and direct sequel into The Curse of Fenric.

Digging Up The Past (Mark Simpson) is another effort to do Bernice Summerfield justice and while it's not half as bad as previous efforts, it's no success either. Quite simply the plot involves Benny sitting at the Doctor's bedside as he recovers from a Pertwee-ish style coma, and don't worry, UNIT are on hand to spell out the similarities in big friendly letters. The reason for this is both the First and Fourth Doctors screwing up an attempt to cage an energy being. Hmm. No wonder they need future Doctor to save their sorry arses...

Just Go Away (Steve Lake) is an interesting look at the oft-neglected Wolsey and how the Doctor would cope with a cat as a companion, specifically the way it would disembowel birds like any ordinary cat and how badly the life-loving Doctor would cope with it. Full of unspoken metaphors and helplessness, it's amazing that no one's done something like this before.

The Sun Hill Slasher (Mark Simpson) is another crossover, with The Bill of all things, because obviously only the presence of soap opera policemen could pad out this slight story about a vampire, or the little interest the author has in the Doctor, Chris and Roz. The Sun Hill gang get the lion's share of everything, and given how badly this fits in with The Bill (which has had many a character make a Dr Who joke), it just feels badly. Ironically, that episode with Sylvester McCoy as the eccentric treasure hunter using the Sun Hill bombing as a distraction to work out his master plan feels better suited to the concept than not.

The same TARDIS crew gets a better deal in The Generation Who Forgot to Live Their Lives (Chris Pollard) for the traditional Decades debacle. A pure historical focussing on the bitter and depressing early punk of the late seventies, the time travellers' murder investigation shows just how they were wasted in Simpson's tale, especially at the crushingly-mundane conclusion to the tale.

The Reign of Floods (Steve Lake) is a four-part epic tale that has a real NA feel to it with a cheeky reference to The Invasion novelization by Ian Marter being extrapolated to a cold war action thriller, with Roz, Chris and the Doctor dealing with the various action tropes. Sex, violence, submarines, curse words, texting, POTUS and no gratuitous fanwank - bar the over-the-top villain being named Briers, anyway...

The Lost Emerald of Meripolis (Mark Ritchie) is another thousand-word tale that means we don't get a good look at the Doctor/Chris only TARDIS team, but that aside it's a diverting 1000-word tale of an alien fisherman finding a doomsday weapon and a certain Time Lord prodding their conscience about what to do with it. The stupid alien names are very grating, though: "I know Zargoleanderboudliator's salvage laws!"

The Crow (Loretta Thessane) is a vacuous 1000-word story challenge that results in the Tenth Doctor encountering someone who looks like Sylvester McCoy in a Whitby town following a visit by Dracula. Frankly, it's longer to explain than to read and why it's listed as Seventh Doctor story at all boggles me.

The Vessel (Kenny Davidson) is a Babylon-5-inspired tale of an expy-Delenn tending a dying expy-Kosh with the Doctor arriving to kill the expy-Vorlon Ambassador for the greater good. Despite the derivative origin, this is a solid entry about the rights, wrongs, nobility and horror of euthanasia with some ghastly puns. Pretty much the Seventh Doctor's era in a nutshell, really...

Prodigal Son (Chris Pollard) takes the lame idea that James Bond was a Time Lord and... well, does something with it, at least. The newborn Pierce Brosnan incarnation is recruited by the Doctor to travel back in time and assassinate "Yamesbond's" father Borusa (now in a pre-teen incarnation) in a time loop or something. Surprisingly adds little to either mythos.

Overlord (Joseph Schofield) is a moving tale of the Seventh Doctor tipping the tide of battle during World War Two while also taking time to save the soul of a German soldier caught in the middle of it. Clever, well-researched and with a dramatic conclusion, this is the sort of thing that should be a Single Fiction baseline.

Carnage (Kaye Redhead) follows a similar line, but it's deliberately pointless and nihilistic. The Doctor saves a soldier on the beaches, but who cares given all those he didn't save? Not to be read if you're in a bright mood.

Nine Lives: Daniel (Simon Skupham) finally threatens to provide a point to the last six time-wasters, but the threat is an empty one. The latest kill-McPhee plot is as un-involving and impenetrable as ever, the Doctor's reason for wanting to save these unpleasant sods is likewise boring. The only plus is it's relative brevity.

Room of 1000 Words (Guy Moon) has the Doctor encountering a room of ghosts and memories, in particular ex-companions from Roz backwards. It's inoffensive, and but for the fact the ghosts tell the Doctor to pull his finger out and stop dwelling on emo-angst, unoriginal but if anyone needed to be told "Lighten the hell up!" then it's the New Adventures crowd, so points for effort.

The Gift (Mark Simpson) is an attempt to give the Seventh Doctor an End of Time style lap of glory as he sees his favorite companion for the last time, but the mundane future for Ace and how feeble a gesture both make to their friendship leave it totally hollow. The direct sequel The Visit does nothing to improve this, alas, nor does the idea the Doctor always sees a vision of the Watcher before his final episode. Sheesh, talk about spoilers.