Following the German defeat in 1945, Europe was divided between two new superpowers and their ideologies. The East was dominated by the Soviet Union, while the West was dominated by the United States. Both sides were determined to undermine and destroy the other at all costs. Their citizens gripped with fear and distrust. The nuclear age had begun, and a new weapon, far dangerous than any other weapon ever conceived, was built.
Captain Jack Harkness was not only unique, but he was also impossible. In the year 200,100, he died fighting the remnants of the Dalek Empire, which was thought to have been destroyed in the aftermath of the Last Great Time War. However, a friend of his brought him back to the world of the living. Before Jack could ask what had happened, his friends had left him behind. Using his own personal time machine, Jack traveled back in time to the Victorian era, although his intention was the modern age.
On Staten Island towards the end of the 19th century, he got into a fight and was stabbed to death. But he once again, came back to life. He fell from high places, fought in both the First and Second World Wars, and was attacked numerous times, and yet in all circumstances, he came back. Jack considered himself to be an impossible force of nature. He called himself the man who could never die.
John Benton had an extraordinary military career. It all started in 1968 when he was at the foundation of the United Nations Intelligence Taskforce (which would later be renamed Unified Intelligence Taskforce), or UNIT for short. He fought the Cybermen under the command of Sir Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart, who was then promoted from a Colonel to a Brigadier.
Benton would remain a member of UNIT during the early seventies and would combat the Autons and the power-hungry Time Lord known as the Master. He worked alongside another Time Lord known as the Doctor. He was among many who admired the Doctor. When the Doctor had chosen to depart UNIT, the Brigadier had chosen to retire, and Benton had been promoted once more. By 1980, he was promoted from the rank of Sergent to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. He left UNIT but remained in the British Army.
Benton was the commanding officer in the Yorkshire nuclear missile base. Despite his military service, Benton disliked nuclear weapons, considering them to be barbaric creations. He would have rather been in command in Hong Kong or Northern Ireland. On the night of the twenty-sixth day of September 1983, Benton would face the most traumatic event of his career and worsen his hatred for his nuclear weapons.
The Doctor, Steven, and Vicki were making their way back to the Northumbrian coastline from the old Catholic monastery after sabotaging the Monk's TARDIS. They eventually reached the cliffs and looked down toward the beach. The Doctor hoped to reach the TARDIS and leave before the Norwegians could make a landing along the coast. While he wished that Barbara was still with them, he did remember that the Norwegians under King Harald Hardrada would invade England and attempt to take the English throne. Harald, unsurprisingly, would fail and England would once again be invaded but this time successfully by Duke William of Normandy.
Vicki and Steven on the other feared that TARDIS was swept up by the tide. Even when the Doctor reassured them that the tide would not affect the TARDIS and that the ship would still be there, the two young time travelers had thought that the Doctor was denying the truth. When they reached the coastline, the Doctor's two young companions would feel relieved, particularly Vicki.
"There it is, my dear," cried the Doctor excitingly, "there's the TARDIS. Safe and sound. Didn't I tell you so?"
"Oh, am I glad to see that old police box again," said Vicki with a sense of both pleasant surprise and relief.
"Oh, glad indeed," the Doctor continued, "well, we must start climbing down the cliff and get aboard as soon as we can. There's going to be an invasion shortly."
"What? You mean any minute now the Viking fleet's going to sail past here," Steven asked.
The Doctor turned toward Steven with a smile on his face. "Yes, my boy, yes. And history will be..." Vicki joined in and the two would finish the statement in unison: "... allowed to take its natural course." Steven laughed when they finished and he began to accept his new life with glee.
"You know," he said, "I'm beginning to like the idea of being a crew member on a time machine."
"A crew member? You'll be lucky. He's the crew. We're just the passengers," Vicki remarked.
"Yes, and both very welcome ones, my dear," said the Doctor, "come along, come along. Come on, come on."
The Doctor and Vicki began the trek down the cliffs while Steven looked down upon the beach. He remarked that he wished that they had a pair of wings as a result of the way down. Because of the Doctor's hatred for climbing, the trio walked down a steep but steady pathway, which made Vicki feel more comfortable, as her fear of heights made her despise climbing. By the time they reached the TARDIS, the sun was beginning to set behind the English countryside and the three of them were exhausted.
The TARDIS dematerialized away from the realm of Anglo-Saxon England and once again into the great unknown. The Doctor and Vicki wondered where the ship would take them next, while Steven began to remember one of the so-called 'technical hitches' that Vicki had told him about. The adventure had just begun.
The Monk had to squeeze inside the now tiny interior of his TARDIS. He struggles to command his ship as it traveled through the time vortex. But he had one goal in mind, he had always wanted to visit Russia. It was a dreadful place in his opinion, but he felt he could extend his influence.
He landed in the summer of 1983. He was fascinated by the Cold War between the Communist Eastern Hemisphere and the Capitalist Western Hemisphere. He found nuclear weapons to be a terrifying force of power and even evil, and he felt that he could bring peace. He had a plan. He could use his so-called magnet-o-nater (he name that he found to be ridiculous) and force the missiles into space.
But first, he would have to convince both sides to fire upon each other like two wild beasts hunting each other for food and power. He chose to land at the Serpukhov-15 bunker located outside Moscow. And he hoped to upload a computer virus into the bunker's computers which would show an American attack. He then planned on traveling to Cheyenne Mountain in Colorado to do the same with that base's computers.