Doctor Who: The Final Confrontations- Series One- Part One

1964. The Beatles are among the favourites of the media, television has hit an all time high, and an alien race is about to invade. Sorry, was that third part a bit strange?

It began in August 1964. Midnight precisely- the entire planet was invaded by a race like no other. Communication was lost from all major areas of the world. The last recorded message from the Royal Air Force headquarters said; "The shops are alive.".

The Tenth Doctor, feeling more happy than ever, was among the crowd who cheered for the Beatles as they left the huge aeroplane that had just landed. The Doctor couldn't stick around, though. His mood had only been lightened because he'd seen the band, but the real reason he was here was so he could deal with a horde of rogue aliens. He hadn't discovered what they were. All he knew was that a Judoon prison carrier crash landed after the prisoners broke the controls. He had to find the aliens fast, before they could do anything to anyone.

High above the airport, a giant cylindrical building held five men at the glass top, all studying the Doctor. Three were behind consoles, getting focus on the man. The other two were watching through the window, discussing.

"Shall we go after him?" said the older man in the military suit. The other man dressed as if he were a scientist shook his head.

"No," he said. "We can't do that until we're sure it's him. With all those people it could be unclear. Wait till he moves away…"

The Doctor looked behind him, studying his surroundings, in case he could see anything not remotely human. Just as he was turning his head back to the Beatles, he noticed a shutter door to the airport opening. It was halfway open, and a giant metal shelf titled on its side. Small objects fell off it and clattered onto the floor. The Doctor pushed past the remainder of the crowd in his way and ran towards the shutter at a fast pace.

The men behind the consoles were following his path on the screens. The military officer at the window called to them.

"Call the soldiers, now!" The men took out large black radiophones. They all called the same words into the devices.

"It's the Doctor! All soldiers in Warehouse Five- after him!"

The Doctor felt like dramatic music was flooding his ears as he chased the shadowy figure ahead of him. It tripped over a small crate and landed on the floor, it's body facing towards a white brick wall- a dead end. On both sides of it were nothing but more weak metal shelves, crates and a sealed door. The Doctor stopped in his tracks. Several armed men came behind him, their shotguns aimed straight at his back.

"Don't move, Doctor!"

"No, no, no, wait! Look at it!" The soldiers tightened their grip on the weapons. The Doctor turned round, glaring at them. "LOOK AT IT!" The man in the middle nodded at two soldiers next to him. They crept past the Doctor, their guns now aimed at the fallen figure. It slowly brought itself up to a crouching position. It then leaned on the floor with it's right leg, and stared at the soldiers. It had no eye pupils. No gap in it's mouth. Chips of it's skin were lying on the floor. A soldier slowly picked it up, and felt it.

"It's… wax. I'd know wax anywhere. But it can't be…"

The 'creature' brought itself to it's feet, and looked at the Doctor. It's arm slowly raised upwards, until it was pointing straight at the Doctor. It then turned to the soldiers, but it's sudden movement had jumped the armed men and their weapons fired straight at it. The bullets went into the creature's skin like it was made of water, but something was wrong. The skin didn't leave. The bullets literally went into the body, then bounced back out again. Unfortunately, the human skin was penetrated and, like the Doctor sadly expected, they were lying on the floor, dead. The other soldiers pushed the Doctor out of the way, firing repeatedly at the creature. The Doctor screamed at them to stop- several bullets had nearly hit the high voltage box. And before the Doctor could tell them this, the next bullet hit it. It only took a few more to send the electricity mad. The wires grew yellow sparks, which turned into flames. The flames coursed up the wire. If they reached the top, the airport would collapse. It was too late. The ceiling fell over the soldiers. Their bodies were crushed underneath the rubble, along with the creature, who's wax body had been electrified, distracted by hundreds of bullets and melted from the fire at the same time. The Doctor had leapt out of the warehouse before the rubble could bring him down. He got up, looking back at the aeroplane where the Beatles and the crowd had been only moments earlier. It wasn't there.

The military man approached the Doctor. He saw the state of Warehouse Five and felt like hitting the Doctor hard, until he saw where the Doctor was looking. They were gone. The crowd. The band. Even the plane was gone.

"But that's impossible! They were right there! All of them." he turned to the Doctor. "What's happened?" The Doctor turned to him.

"How do you know me?"

The military man sighed.

"You've met us before. Very briefly. You said you had just had your 'first regeneration'." The Doctor looked confused.

"Right… oh, yes! I remember! Long ago, that was!"

"Actually it was a few hours ago, Doctor. Well, to us anyway."

"Did I know you for a while because you seem to know enough about me?"

"Yes. You said you expected to come here again to see the Beatles one day. You said that if you did, we'd better be ready for him."

"Did I say that?"

"Yes. We had to aim our weapons at you just in case you did anything to hurt us. We have to take precautions, you know. But after what I've just seen from that warehouse, it wasn't worth it. You believed that you'd only return here if something was wrong."

"Yes… yes, I did. The TARDIS was picking up a problem with the time vortex. It brought me here. This must be its source… oh…. THAT'S IT!" The military man jumped as the Doctor raised his voice.

"What's it?"

"The Autons… that creature was an Auton. They escaped a prison carrier ship. That must be one of them. Don't you see? The plane, the Beatles, the crowd- they're not gone! They're still there!"

"Carrier ship? You mean… a spaceship? There's aliens out there? How many?"

"Another time, maybe."

"Sorry. But… you said its all still there. But how?"

"That's what we need to find out… come on!" The Doctor ran back to Warehouse Five. He studied the rubble. "You… what's your name? I must've forgot your name!"

"Thornton, James Thornton. You can call me Brigadier."

"Ah! Another Brigadier! Fantastic! Brigadier- help me lift this rubble out of the way." He began to throw huge pieces of stone behind him.

"All of it?"

"No! Just enough for us to be able to get over it, now help!" The Brigadier nodded and quickly through the debris behind him, quicker than the Doctor was. He noticed the Doctor's amazement.

"I've done this kind of thing before, Doctor. Back in the war!" He lifted a final large chunk of stone, and dropped it next to his feet. "Is that enough?" The Doctor looked at the piles of rubble he had thrown away, squinting his eyes. He then smiled.

"Oh yes!" The Doctor and the Brigadier stepped onto the remainder of the rubble. Parts of the crushed soldiers were sticking out through the gaps. The Brigadier gasped at it. The Doctor held his arms. "It's alright, James. Try not to look. C'mon…" He slowly turned the Brigadier away from the dead soldiers, and towards the sealed door to their left. They stepped off the higher piles of rubble, until they got to the door. It was all steel, and locked with a metal bar.

"No-one has ever opened that." said the Brigadier. "No-one knows how you open it. We still haven't found out who made it in the first place."

"You open it by holding the bar with an alien hand. Since the Autons aren't expecting any other species to be here, there's no reason to believe that something like a Slitheen is gonna pop in."

"These Autons… they're in there? How do you know?"

"Because I recognise their technology. The only other species they expect to be see is me, a Time Lord. The problem is, they would've defended that against my DNA. That's why…. that's why it pointed at me! It was getting my genetic codes! Then it turned to the soldiers. It's body was in exact line with the door. One of it's feet moved backwards before it was shot. It must've sent my information to its superiors, then made for the door to get away! Oh… that Nestene is clever!"

"Nestene?"

"The Nestene Consciousness. It's planet was destroyed in a great war- the Time War. I've defeated it before- but there's many of them out there, surviving. They can reproduce in minutes. But it takes an awful lot of preparation. These Autons are literally just dummies- they are controlled by the Nestene, and will obey any of its wishes. I think this door leads to the Consciousness's lair."

"But we can't get in…"

The Doctor frowned. "Didn't I tell you?" The Brigadier raised an eyebrow. "I've got this!" He showed his sonic screwdriver to the Brigadier. The Doctor smiled and pointed the small device at the metal bar locking the door. The tip of the sonic screwdriver glowed blue, and the bar opened.

"You are brilliant, Doctor. You really are." the Brigadier chuckled. The Doctor mouthed "I know!". He slowly pushed the door open. It creaked slightly, and a circular orange light could be seen at the very end of an arched corridor. The corridor was heading downwards, underground. All the walls were made of wires.

"I bet that if you moved those wires out of the way, they'll be something going on in there. It can't be this complicated just for an orange light." The Doctor nodded. He was more interested in the light. It gradually got smaller as they came closer, until it was only the size of a two-pound coin.

"Strange…" The Doctor was about to continue speaking when a new voice echoed from above. The voice could only be recognised by the Brigadier. It was the scientist. The scientist he was having a discussion with earlier.

"Hello, Doctor. Ah, hello, James. Pleasure to meet you, Doctor. I am Dr. Peters. Or you could call me… the Nestene Consciousness!" The scientist was leaning over a small blue balcony. They were standing in a little chamber. On the curved wall behind Peters were five small glass chambers. Each had different dressed human beings inside. The Doctor had two important questions to ask the man.

"Hello, Nestene Peters, or should I say… Dr. Nestene. That sounds good! Dr. Nestene! Anyway… first of all… what's happened to the Beatles, the crowd and the aeroplane, Nestene?" After the comment about his name, the man sneered at him.

"In answer to your question, Doctor… we, the Nestenes, have got into time travelling. We managed to secure the three obstructions in a time trap."

"Obstructions?"

"Yes… they were in the way of my plot. If you look up the Beatles' arrival, I don't think you'll see any mention of soldiers being killed, aliens invading, etc. We don't want to change history- we want to keep this period in a time trap so that there will be nothing on Earth that can stop our invasion. It shall go on forever!"

"But why 1964?"

"The prison carrier ship piloted by the Judoon officer was caught in a space wormhole. That wormhole took us through time. The controls on the ship were broken, and we happened to land in 1964, Earth, England. We knew that you would find us, but we had no other option. We'd already made a plan for invasion in case we ever got away from the Judoon- AND WE DID!" The scientist laughed to himself. The Brigadier cut in.

"Good for you, but… who's 'we'?"

"Me and the other Nestenes. The Judoon managed to retrieve them after the Doctor arrived. They left just as the aeroplane landed, so that the noise of its take-off wouldn't be heard by the crowd."

"And now what?" asked the Brigadier. He reached for the gun attached to his belt. "What are you going to do now?" The 'Nestene' turned round, facing a small console between two of the glass tanks. He pulled two large levers down- one at the top-left of the console, and another at the top-right of the console. Lights flickered all over the walls, including the small orange light, which blinded the Doctor and the Brigadier.

"James…" the Doctor shouted.

"Yes, Doctor?"

"That thing you said about the walls… I think you were right." They spun round to look at the many wires. They were all falling. One by one, the large black tubes fell onto the grated floor, piling up. The Doctor ran to the falling wires. As he looked beyond them, hundreds of staircases were lit up, but by what? The Doctor gestured the Brigadier to follow him, but he refused.

"James! With me!"

"No, Doctor! There's something else I must do! Now go!"

Alarms went off around the chamber. Crashing noises, whirring noises, explosions… the Autons had touched British soil. The Doctor sprinted through the gaps in the walls. Hundreds of Autons were walking up the staircases. They were all wax look-alikes of the humans in the glass tanks. The Doctor pushed past them. He could hear the deadly sounds of their weaponry as he got closer to the staircase. These creatures were not to be given a chance- they were just dummies. Pure dummies, and they were not going to get in his way. He pushed several of the Autons over the edge of the staircase during the speedy journey to the top. He could see now- shutters. The Autons were travelling through shutters, out into the open air, where they could invade, and with everyone in a time trap, there would be no-one to get in the Autons' way.

The Brigadier spotted a spiral staircase beyond an open door that led up to the balcony. He took out his gun and quickly ran up the stairs. He got to the top of the stairs, aiming his gun at the Nestene. He slowly approached the traitor. The gun moved away from the scientist and instead it was aimed at the console.

"What are you doing!?" the disguised Nestene gasped. The Brigadier replied with the most serious expression on his face the scientist had ever seen.

"My duty." He fired the small pistol held tightly in his hand. He fired it three times at the console, before the Nestene's hand began to melt into a lava-like substance. He forced the substance at the Brigadier, who fell to the floor in agony. He was burnt all over. It didn't seem to be as hot as lava, but it was still hot enough to kill him. The Nestene ran over the fallen soldier, down the spiral staircase, over the piles of wiring, up the staircase, and then to the landing area, standing just underneath where the aeroplane would've been. The Doctor stood opposite him. On one side of the Doctor stood an army of Autons, on his other, another army of Autons.

"At arms!" cried the Nestene. Parts of his body were getting softer, turning orange, then starting to melt. The two armies on either side of the Doctor aimed their weapons at him. He was truly surrounded. The Nestene started to complain about his state.

"What's happening to me!?"

"The controls…" the Doctor murmured. "The controls! They control a life support system! Am I right?" The Nestene nodded at him. "Oh… I am brilliant!"

"And you're dead, if you don't listen to me. You've got… two choices. Either let us kill you, then take over the world quickly and quietly with no obstructions, or… we can bring everyone back and massacre them. Yes, there aren't many Autons for a global invasion, but I'll have more armies reproducing every moment, every second. So… your choice, Doctor…"

The Brigadier was desperately trying to get himself up, and when he clung onto the console to pull himself up, the attack from Dr. Peters kicked in again, stinging his body all over. He screamed and fell to the floor, panting. He looked at the gun and reached out for it. His finger managed to get onto the trigger and pull the gun closer. He grabbed it, aimed it at the console and shot it again. He kept firing until his ammo run out. The console exploded furiously- sparks flying everywhere. The five humans contained in the tanks vanished in blue light. A small monitor on the wall read; CAPTIVES RETURNED TO DESTINATION- WHITE ROSE SHOPPING CENTRE, ENGLAND, EARTH, 2010.

"YES! I DID IT! I-" electricity flowed through the rest of the lair. The whole place burst into flames, devouring the Brigadier and everything else with him.

Fire blew the shutters away on either side of the airport. The Nestene's body was now fully orange, and not remotely human. It was melting to the ground, slowly evaporating into thin air. Meanwhile, the two armies of Autons were breaking down. Their bodies were shaking all over, until each blew a few sparks then fell to the floor.

"The lair's gone! The five humans returned to their everyday lives! Your life support system has been destroyed! You're dying! But how? What happened to you?"

"Your war! The Time War! It destroyed out planet, then corrupted the Nestenes! One day, Doctor, you shall get your reward- a reward for destroying worlds!"

"It wasn't like that! I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I couldn't save you. I couldn't save any of your people. I'm sorry."

"It doesn't matter, because one day, Doctor… one day you shall meet your end, and the Time Lords shall return!"

"They won't. I know that. Nothing is going to happen."

"And yet… the end of time is approaching…" The Doctor was about to reply, but it was too late. The Nestene's body dropped to the floor, bubbling and evaporating into the air. The Doctor looked up into the sky. He could see the time vortex fading in and out. The time trap was about to go. He stepped back to where the crowd were cheering for the Beatles. A blinding flash of light occurred and when the Doctor regained his sight, everything was back to normal. The airport was back in its normal state. This was now a fixed point in time- no matter what anyone saw or heard, it would somehow never get around. Cause and effect would always be there to keep things hidden. The Doctor entered the airport, heading to the entrance to the Watch Tower. No-one else had entered it except Dr. Peters, the Brigadier and the 'three men', because they couldn't. The TARDIS was obstructing them. The Doctor opened the TARDIS doors, locked them behind him, sat back on his 'settee' and thought about the Brigadier.

"He was a good man. He didn't fight when it was unnecessary, he didn't argue or question me too much. And the best thing about him was… he didn't salute." The Doctor got up, pulled a small lever next to the TARDIS console screen, and smiled.

"Next destination… anywhere!"

NEXT TIME (every preview of the next story has a line taken from the story):

"The heavens are calling to us, Doctor! Soon… I shall be at one with the Gods, and nothing will stop me!"