Plot: What if the fourth Doctor wasn't trapped in the vortex during 'the Five Doctors'? What if he had appeared in the death zone with the other Doctors?
Authors Notes: This is not a complete re-write of the Five Doctors, it will only detail how events might have happened if the fourth Doctor did appear in the Death Zone with the other Doctors and will be written mostly from the Fourth Doctor's and Romana's point of view.
This story will contain spoilers to the real 'the Five Doctors' since its plot occurs along side it.
Enjoy
Doctor Who
Tom Baker
In
The Five Doctors
By TimeLordParadox
(Aka Ross Pickering)
Based off the TV episode originally written by Terrance Dicks.
(Shada dialogue originally written by Douglas Adams)
Prologue
In a dark control room on the planet Gallifrey a man stands poised at the controls of his machine, a very advanced machine, a machine which had been deactivated for centuries. It was primitive he admitted but it would serve his purpose. The mans black gloved hands played over the controls. He had one goal in mind, but he couldn't accomplish it. Not by himself. So he had 'enlisted help' from a Time Lord called the Doctor.
But not just one Doctor, all Doctors, the Doctor in all five of his currently existing incarnations. The Shadowy man had the first three Doctors already. The first, an old man with white hair who he'd snatched in a garden on Earth. The second Doctor, also on Earth visiting an old friend, who was also snagged up with him. The third Doctor, also on earth, driving an outdated mode of transport, more outdated than his usual travel machine; that old crock of a type 40 Time Capsule.
The Shadowy man had been watching the Doctor for a long time and he knew him, the Doctor was at his most effective when he had someone to show off to. Which is why he travelled with companions, human pets he collected. Though he'd never regarded them as pets, that's what they were. So the shadowy man had also captured some of his past 'pets'. His granddaughter, going under the name Susan Foreman, snatched from Earth in the year 2188. She will soon join the first Doctor.
The Shadowy man had also picked up an earth girl from 1983 who had been companion to both the third and fourth Doctors. She will join the Doctors third incarnation.
The dark man conceded what he was doing was incredibly dangerous and potentially damaging to the timeline if he wasn't careful. But the price for what was at stake for him was too high. He picked up a pair of wax figures, one resembled the earth girl called 'Sarah Jane Smith' the other the girl 'Susan Foreman'. He placed them down on a pedestal which had a model of 'the Death Zone.' A small area on Gallifrey where thousands of years ago the Time Lords used to kidnap other beings to fight each other for their own entertainment. The games had been stopped by Rassilon, the greatest of all the Time Lords. Now the only thing remarkable about the Death Zone was the sight of the Great Tower of Rassilon, which served as the great Time Lords tomb.
With all five Doctors working at different angles towards the tower surely one of them would work out a way of getting through its defences.
The model depicting the Death Zone was divided into five separate sections. Each one a different starting point for each of the Doctors, and in the dead centre of these different five zones was the Tower of Rassilon. On the model were several other small figures which were in the shape of the other three Doctors and their companions.
The man in the dark robes placed Sarah's figure next to the one of the third Doctor, then placed Susan's figure down next to the first Doctor. They will meet up soon enough with time, he decided.
He turned back to the machine which was collecting the Doctors. The 'Time Scoop' as it was once called. To go for his next target, the fourth Doctor. Using the Time Scoop he searched the Doctors timeline for a suitable position where he could pluck him out without any overall damage to the Web of Time.
It was difficult because this Doctor seemed to love getting into trouble. There was not one instance in his timeline where he wasn't doing anything but meddling in the universe somehow. The Shadow man can't just pluck him out from wherever he pleased, it had to be just right. But this was unfortunate, there wasn't a single instance in this Doctors long life where he could safely be removed and not suffer unstable effects. If not to the web of time then to the Doctor's timeline itself endangering his future incarnations.
He weighed the options and decided to go for the most suitable time where it was safe to lift him out.
The Doctor was on Earth. He seemed to have an affinity for Earth, specifically a tiny damp little island called Britain, and was specifically in a place called Cambridge. A screen above the console the Shadow man worked on showed him, the Doctor. A tall man with long curly hair and quite large smiling teeth, he was wearing a hat over his curls, a white shirt with a brown waist coat, boots and brown trousers.
In this time period he was travelling with Romanadvoratrelundar, who he had started calling 'Romana' for short. She wasn't as the Shadow man remembered when she left Gallifrey to join the Doctor. She had obviously regenerated. Regeneration was the same process which allowed there to be five different Doctors. This version of Romana was slightly shorter than the last one, with long blond hair reaching down her back.
The Doctor appeared to be on a narrow boat on a river, which seemed to have old looking buildings around and plenty of greenery. The Doctor stood at one end of the boat using a long pole to push the boat along. A very primitive form of propulsion. While Romana was sitting in the boat at the other side reading a book while a strange looking horn like device played the Earth equivalent of music.
"Wordsworth." Came the Doctors deep voice "Brumford, Christopher Smart, Andrew Marvel, Judge Jefferies." Was he speaking to her in an alien language or was that a list of something?
"Owen Chadwick" he suddenly said pointing at Romana as if he had realised something.
"Who?" Distracted Romana looked up from her book.
"Owen Chadwick, oh yes." He said as he raised the wooden pole and dropped it back into the water, then pushed on it to propel the long, thin boat along. "One of the greatest labourers in the history of Earth in the first era."
"Newton of course." Said Romana looking at something on the shore the shadowy figure could not see.
"Oh! Definitely Newton." the Doctor said.
"For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction, yes?" Romana asked
"That's right." Came the Doctors words. It was such a simple idea why was the Doctor being so admirable that a bunch of primitives had worked it out?
"So Newton invented punting!" said Romana smiling at the Doctor. 'Punting' must be what the Doctor is doing with that long pole, a mode of transport which was an ideal example of the third law of motion.
"Oh yes!" the Doctor said smiling "There was no limit to Isaac's' genius"
He called a primitive a genius for discovering something the shadowy figure himself had known while humans still hadn't worked out how to turn the first wheel?
They were going under a bridge now and were coming out the other side.
"Isn't it funny how something so primitive can be so…" Romana searched for the words
"Graceful?" the Doctor suggested.
"No simple. You push in one direction and the boat goes in the other."
"Yes, it's pure genius!"
This was during one of the Doctors 'adventures' and by the look of his time stream, an important one because it would lead to something disastrous if he didn't live it. But it was the only place the Shadow man could safely lift the Doctor free of his time stream. Making up his mind he set the controls to snag the Doctor, he could always return him to this exact time and place when he was finished.
The scoop was sent.
"Oh I do love the spring, all the leaves and colours." Romana said looking around at the trees
"It's October." the Doctor said.
"I thought you said we were coming here for May Week?" Romana asked.
"I did." He admitted lifting the pole out of the water again, "May weeks in June." Confusion crossed Romana's face and she shook her head slightly
"I'm confused" she said.
"So is the TARDIS, haha." He laughed slightly. 'TARDIS' was the name he gave to his outdated transport through space and time. A name which had now been adopted by all telepathic circuits so its actual name was always translated as 'TARDIS'.
"Oh I do love the autumn, all the leaves and colours." Romana said again correcting her previous mistake. Where was that time scoop? He was growing impatient!
"Yes, well with something as simple as a punt nothing can go wrong." The Doctor said comparing his outdated mode of transport to that even more outdated mode of transport. "No coordinates and no dimensional stabilisers." He said lifting the pole out of the water again and he used it to push them along.
"Nothing." He added "Just the water, the punt…" he dropped the punt down into the water again, "a strong pair of hands…" he strained to say "…and a pole." He didn't notice that his hands slipped off the pole and he was no longer holding it. It was now sticking out of the water being left behind as the boat continued on its way. When the Doctor realised this he tried to reach back to grab it but it was just out of reach now. He waved his arms as he began to lose his balance and was about to fall into the water when…
There it was! The time scoop! A large black triangle coming from the sky towards him. The Doctor hadn't noticed it and could do nothing as it enveloped both of them, they and the boat vanished in an instant as it swallowed them up. Then it raised itself back into the sky heading back towards Gallifrey.
The shadowy figure placed his hands on the controls, he now had to guide the Doctor to Gallifrey carefully. The position which he'd plucked him from was so riddled with possible time paradoxes that navigation proved difficult.
Something was wrong! He was losing the Doctor, no! If he lost the fourth Doctor then the fifth Doctor would certainly feel the effects. If he couldn't stop it then he'd have to try to seal him inside the vortex to make sure he doesn't destroy his fifth incarnation and his whole future beyond that point.
It wasn't working! He hit the control panel in frustration.
But wait! Yes, he was coming out of that tangled mess of a time stream he occupied. Excellent! He was heading towards Gallifrey and would join his 'other selves' in the death zone.
A pair of plastic three inch high figures faded into view in a window above the machine. He picked them up. One was of the Doctor in his ridicules garb of a long brown coat and extremely long scarf. The other was Romana, wearing the clothes she'd been wearing in the image. These weren't really the Doctor and Romana, simply representations the real Doctor and Romana. The real ones were currently stuck in the Time Scoop waiting to be set down where he wanted. He placed both down in a vacant section of the map, and the section of the map began to glow and pulsate as the scoop proceeded to dropped them down there. The pulsating light became constant indicating they had arrived.
Now for the last Doctor, the fifth. Who was the only one not on earth, which was a change. He was at a place called the Eye of Orion. He must be feeling the effects of these time snatches from his timeline since he was the 'current,' and probably felt a great jab of pain as each one had been taken from his time stream. He must be feeling an enormous bout of pain now as his fourth incarnation was technically ripped from his timeline rather then simply lifted out. He didn't know if the fifth Doctor would now be fit to join this quest because of it. But a simple encounter with his first and most stable incarnation will fix that. When he captures the fifth he'll set him down near the first Doctor to give him a strong link to his timeline.
The Shadow man walked away to operate the time scoop, one final time scoop and he'd have all of them, and they would unwittingly give him what he desired most.
Immortality!