Fictions Mentioned: Doctor Who/Faction Paradox, Star Wars, xxxHolic / Tsubasa: Resevoir Chronicles

Episode 5 – Operation: Mondas

OP Song:

Mother - YU-NO: Kono Yo no Hate de Koi o Utau Shoujo(Opening 2 Full w/ Lyrics & Subs in English)[4K]

The Doctor was standing inside The War Room on Gallifrey a few days of Meta-Time later. For such an important place in a war as serious as The Time War, the room was hardly larger than a basketball court on Earth. It was typical of The Time Lord's way of thinking, and if you went around the city, you would find many Time Lords who were serenely ignoring the state of things that was going on all around them. Most of the time anyway. So many of his people went out of their way to believe that The Time War was someone else's business and nothing to worry about which was absolute bollocks in his opinions. There were moments when The Doctor wanted to strangle some of those individuals dressed in their ornate robes and make them wake up, and he even nursed the private thought that The Daleks actually did invade The Capitol. It would mean The End of The War and leaving The Multiverse Clusters of The Whoniverse wide open for The Daleks, but The Daleks would make those self-important idiots wake up and smell the Arkelis flower sap as The Entire Multiverse burn all around them.

The Doctor was casting a professional eye around the room, studying the numerous frontlines and backlines when a young member of the army came to him to tell him that Lord President Eternal Rassilon himself wanted to speak with him in The Temporal Control Tower. The soldier was breathless, overexcited by the notion of being in the presence of Rassilon and The Doctor couldn't blame her, though he took The Legends of both Omega and Rassilon with a grain of salt, his own personal histories with the two men were shadowing what he had learnt about them both among his countless millennia of a lifetime.

Ignoring the looks that she sent him, The Doctor let himself be escorted to The Temporal Control Tower and to the transport lifts in order to reach the main hall where The Time Lords monitored the Web of Time. The Temporal Control Tower was one of the largest structures on Gallifrey next to the Panopticon, so large that many Time Lords considered it and The Panopticon Building as the two hearts of Time Lord society. They were right - The Panopticon Tower held The Panopticon Hall itself, The Council Chamber, The President's Living Area and those of The Chancellor and the other High Council Members. But The Doctor had always considered The Temporal Control Tower far more important.

As the transport moved him and his escort to the control room, The Doctor did his best to ignore the city's new desktop theme with its darker hues which seemed devoid of the typical Time Lord extravagance, and just focused on what Rassilon could want. It was probably nothing good, but why not meet him at The War Room?

The door opened and The Doctor and his escort walked into the massive temporal control room. The Doctor had visited the room several times before since returning to Gallifrey in order to take part in the fighting and it had changed greatly over the course of the war and become even more larger.

It was about twice the size of a football field with massive banks of computers and displays showing segments of The Web of Time beyond the massive dominating 3-D hologram in the middle of the room. The room was on multiple levels going up with the same consoles and display areas on them. Deceptively, this version of the TCR featured massive windows that showed the outside of the tower to give the impression from The Time Lord Technicians and Visitors that the place was just an ordinary building. Cheap trick. The Tower was created with the same technology as a TARDIS. It was dimensionally transcendental and made up of Block Transfer Computations to make it a complex space-time event, and to allow the protyon core, the living computer mind, access to The Web of Time.

When he'd been in his first incarnation long before he'd left Gallifrey behind with Susan, The Doctor had worked here. He'd come as a kind of apprentice and he had learnt a great deal about The Domain of The Time Lords, and he knew how The Time Lords here reacted whenever someone tried to change history, one of the many reasons he had initially worked hard to keep a low profile.

The young Time Lady led him over to Rassilon. The Time Lord Founder had removed his outer robe of office, leaving him clad in his grey tunic. The President wasn't alone at his table. There was a bland looking Time Lord in grey and a Time Lord wearing the traditional garb of The Temporal Control Elite. The most incongruous member of the little group, who clearly didn't belong there, was a Time Lady wearing deep red and gold. She looked terribly young and it was clear she had never fought in the war, and judging from her expression she was both uncaring about the whole Time War thing and didn't like being here.

"Ah Doctor, good of you to join us," Rassilon said, "sit down. We have a mission for you."

The Doctor did as he was told, not in the mood for any more trouble than what he got himself into since The Time War began. Rassilon introduced the group. Milvo, The Time Lord in black, and The Associate who represented the Celestial Intervention Agency - that one intrigued The Doctor, who'd had dealings with them in the past - and lastly Lady Lorna.

Rassilon, not one to beat around the bush, stood up and gestured at the massive relativity map of The Web. "The Web of Time, Doctor. The Daleks and their Axis Allies are throwing everything they have at us, and more. Yet they are causing no damage to our reality on a scale which can cause tremendous damage, yet they are not that stupid. But that doesn't stop them from trying." Rassilon turned to face the Doctor. "Tell me, Doctor, what do you know about Mondas?"

A chill of surprise and trepidation went down the Doctor's spine. He was right - this meeting couldn't be good, and a dawning suspicion of what was going to come out of Rassilon's mouth filled him with dread. "Mondas was the twin world of The Planet Earth-"

"Your favorite planet, Doctor, please go on."

"Mondas broke away from Earth because of an accident, it was enough to catapult the planet and blast it out of the solar system. The disaster wrecked the surface and forced the survivors underground. The Mondasians were more advanced than their cousins on Earth. Over the centuries of travelling through space they found their race was getting weak. Their lifespans were shortening. They started undergoing experimental surgery transplants using bionic and cybernetic technologies. An organic limb became a metal limb, 10 times faster and more resilient than the original. It took time but eventually they discovered a way of purging the emotions and linking the brain to a computer network. The Mondasians act of desperation created the Cybermen. What's happened? Why are you bringing Mondas up?"

Rassilon sighed and went silent as he searched for the right words before he spoke again. "We have received an intelligence report from The CIA," he glanced at the grey faced Time Lord who hadn't moved in inch compared to the young, inexperienced Time Lady, who looked uncomfortable, "saying that The Daleks plan to save Mondas. When they invaded The Matrix," he paused, the suppressed rage at what the Daleks did clear in his face before pushing it away to speak again, "they stole a lot of information." The Doctor sighed and nodded, guessing where this was going. "They raided The CIA and The Temporal Records on Mondas, and the Cybermen's plan to save Mondas."

Rassilon turned to the Time Lord who represented the CIA, whatever he was thinking unclear. Then he turned back to face The Doctor. "Correct, Doctor. I also know you personally watched the destruction of Mondas, and prevented the Cybermen from saving it. Tell us how, it might help us find the appropriate time to stop the Daleks."

"Well, The Cybermen had been fighting a long series of wars - don't ask me how long - with an alliance of powerful planets. It was a force they couldn't fight, they were dying in large numbers. I stopped an initial attack on Earth when they tried to destroy the planet to destroy the unity of that alliance, leaving The Cybermen to it. But a time vessel landed on Telos. The Cybermen captured it, studied it and learnt how it worked, and The Cyber-Controller formed a plan. They sent back in time a small group of Cybermen to Earth a year before Mondas was due to return, divert a comet to impact the planet before Mondas broke up when the richer source of energy Earth possessed overwhelmed it. Crude but effective," the Doctor explained.

"Have The Cybermen tried this again since?"

"No. They've tried to turn Earth into New Mondas a few times, but it's never worked. But they have never tried to finish the job they started when that time vessel landed on Telos. I have met other Cybermen with time travel technology, presumably gleaned from studies made to the vessel they originally captured."

Rassilon looked thoughtful. "You said The Cybermen travelled back a year before Mondas's destruction. Is it possible The Dalek taskforce has done the same thing?"

The Doctor thought about it a moment before he replied, "The Daleks have more experience with time travel than the Cybermen. Granted, they don't care much about history, but if I wanted to disrupt history on a massive scale then Mondas would be an ideal candidate."

"Why is that?" The Time Lady, Lady Lorna, spoke for the first time.

The Doctor turned to look at her. "Mondas's destruction has become a major part of The Web of Time. Its destruction gave humans better space travel technology with the leftover Cyberships left behind in the attack, technology which would eventually usher in the digital age and basic bionic technology. But for the wider universe as a whole, civilizations rose and died, great empires were formed. It also had a massive effect and shaped the history and future of the Cybermen. By the time of the far future, they became known as The Cyberlords who were a later stage of Cybermen who had become peaceful. They organized The Cyberlord Hegemony, which existed as one of the major political powers during the time of The Union. They have been one of our greatest allies in The War ever since."

"That makes this mission even more important," Rassilon said, his mind obviously made up. "Doctor, you will take Lady Lorna with you to Mondas, which is where and when we believe The Daleks will be, and you will stop them."

The Doctor looked at Rassilon suspiciously. "Why is Lady Lorna coming with me?"

Rassilon glared at him but he didn't seem too unsurprised by The Doctor's question, fortunately Lorna answered for herself. "I wanted to do my part for the war," she said before just stopping, clearly not prepared to say anymore. But the Doctor wasn't convinced. He made a mental note to keep an eye on her.

That was the only reason he decided to just accept the mission and leave.

The Doctor was basking in The TARDIS Console Room. It had been so long since he'd been in the mental embrace of his oldest and most constant friend, going from one battle to another. Well, not anymore. He was taking his TARDIS everywhere and everywhen throughout The Known and Unknown Multiverse, whether The Time Lords liked it or not, though truthfully he had a feeling they were trying to stop him from running off like he had in the past.

They needn't have to worried about that - he was done running from The War, but that didn't mean that he wasn't prepared to launch his own private little war against The Daleks. His 501st Legion, The 7th Sky Corps and the rest of The Clone Troopers of The STARS can attest to that. He wasn't just basking in The TARDIS's embrace simply because he had missed her, he was also trying to ignore Lorna. The girl was as annoying as Romana had been when he'd first met her, but where the first Romana had been quietly disdainful of his TARDIS though she'd quickly warmed up to both, The Doctor doubted Lorna would anytime soon. The Time Lady was used to TARDISES being neat, like their default states and not like The TARDIS'S current desktop showed, a right mess of a console room. The Time Lady had raised a fuss about her clothes when The Doctor told her to get something more practical on, even giving her a list of what she should wear. Lorna hadn't liked that, but he'd raised a major argument. But he had been firm. Leaving him in a huff, the Doctor had used the quiet to study The Mondas File in the databanks and what he had asked The Time Lords for before he'd left.

It wasn't easy for him to find the right place to figure out where and when The Daleks could be on Earth's drifting twin, but he worked out a few ideas. But he would need to do a passive scan when The TARDIS neared Mondas. The Doctor licked his lips nervously as The TARDIS entered the temporal orbit of Mondas two years before The Cybermen's attempt to launch Halley's comet into Earth during those early days of his sixth incarnation, and waited. Finally, The TARDIS picked up the temporal signature of a Dalek time machine and he picked up its location. As he did, The TARDIS detected a small but growing amount of time energy. What were they doing, was this part of their plan? Lorna came in, wearing a jumper with a khaki jacket over it, black cargo pants and simple shoes. The Doctor nodded at her approvingly before he said, "Good timing, we're landing on Mondas."

The Time Lady swallowed nervously, all her bravado gone in the face of their mission. The Doctor took her silence as confirmation of her readiness and programmed The TARDIS to land. He used the scanner to look outside and saw there was no one there, neither Cyberman or Dalek.

"It's safe," he said before he powered The TARDIS down and left the console room, but he sent a signal out over the communications system to the Cybermen to stop them from noticing any organic beings out in their city. Lorna followed him. The air smelt stale but it was still breathable. The TARDIS had landed them in a large storeroom. There were shelves upon shelves stuffed full of junk. The Doctor studied it, looking sadly at the cluster of dusty and long forgotten toys which would never be held by anyone, barring himself, again. This place was clearly where the Cybermen had simply discarded the possessions of the people they had once been.

Lorna meanwhile was staring at the TARDIS. "It hasn't changed."

"What?"

"Your TARDIS's chameleon circuit should have-"

"The circuit got stuck Meta-Years Ago, and any repairs that I have made were either interrupted or the forms taken weren't appropriate. Besides, it wouldn't make any difference," the Doctor said grimly, "The Daleks raided The Matrix, remember. They stole large amounts of knowledge from it, knowing they would eventually have to be much better at time travel in order to take on The Time Lords. They used the information to design better time ships, learn how to create an Eye of Harmony, and how to detect and fight TARDISes regardless of what forms they take. Trust me, The Daleks would only need to take one look and see it's a TARDIS, because of the amount of tachyons and artron particles floating around it. Now let's go, we've got a mission to do."

As they left the room without any more arguments, The Doctor took out two things. A large blaster and a boxy device. Lorna looked at the box curiously, "What is that thing, Doctor?"

The Doctor showed it to her. It was a box with a circular dial, one half showing a bronze-gold semicircle, the other showing a silver semicircle. "It's a detector, it picks up both Daleks and Cybermen. We're both safe, for now. Come on. It also picks up time emissions."

The Time Lords walked silently through the corridors of the Mondasian city when the detector started to click. The Doctor paused and checked it, noticing the needle was approaching the silver half of the dial.

"Oh no," he whispered before looking frantically for a place to hide.

"What is it, Daleks?"

"No, but just as bad," the Doctor found a door with a white window pane and took out the sonic screwdriver from its hoop in his bandolier. The door lock immediately clicked and the Doctor ushered Lorna inside, quickly taking in the details of the room, and he pulled The Time Lady to the comparative safety of the other side of the door.

"Stay very still and don't make a sound," he whispered. Second rolled by and then they heard the sound of heavy footprints as something large walked down the corridor they'd just left. The Doctor watched as the massive shape of the Cyberman walked past briskly. The Doctor lifted up his detector, and he and Lorna saw the needle gradually leave the silver half and back into neutral.

"We'll stay here until we're sure it's gone. They must not find us," the Doctor said before looking properly at the room before adding grimly, "unless we want to be in here."

The room they were inside was filled with metal beds with surgical instruments neatly arranged on nearby tables. The walls were lined with alcoves the size of a telephone box, stuffed full of electronic wiring and webbing. Out of the corner of The Doctor's eye, he noticed Lorna shuddering when she caught sight of the primitive but effective medical saws. "It's alright. I sent a signal to keep The Cybermen from looking for us, and to confuse their instruments and traps, but if they find us, this is our fate or hitsuzen as my old friend Yuko Ichihara used to say."

"What is this place?"

"Cybermen don't reproduce naturally. They have to use living beings to keep their numbers up," The Doctor looked grimly around the room. He had seen far too many examples of this process around The Meta-Years, seeing it gradually improve and become more sophisticated. By far this room was the most primitive he had seen. "They take their victims to rooms like this. Strap them down on these tables, and they begin to exchange their living parts for machinery. They begin by using drugs designed to numb the brain's emotional and pain centers. It's the only way The Cybermen are able to introduce their technologies into the living being," the Doctor said grimly, remembering how Toberman had his arm amputated whilst his brain was conditioned to obey The Cyber-Controller, the bodies of humanoids in a row in the main laboratory on Telos during their plan to use Halley's comet on Earth, that nightmarish timeline where a version of him betrayed everything he had believed in and surrendered The TARDIS to The Cybermen and allowing the cosmos to be overwhelmed by their disease.

But the one which would haunt him the most just by looking around this crude, but effective surgery was when his previous self and Destrii were on that Cybership from the future which had travelled back in time to change history forcibly and convert the whole human race. The Doctor would never forget those trays upon trays of half-naked humans, their brains being slowly reconditioned to accept Cyber-Conversion.

Lorna shuddered. "It's disgusting."

"It's Desperate. For the Mondasians, it was their only way to survive. They couldn't just launch themselves into space and find a decent planet to colonize. They had spent most of their lives underground, they'd have gone mad just by looking out on to the surface of their world."

"You sound like you approve of what they did-"

"No, I don't, and don't you dare claim I do," the Doctor snapped at her, seeing the Time Lady's face puff with indignation though he caught sight of a little fear in her eyes as well, "I've seen The Cybermen spread out like The Daleks, destroying countless civilizations, tearing individuality away from their victims all in the name of survival."

"So that's The Dalek Timeship? I thought they'd use something a bit more unobtrusive," Lorna commented. She and the Doctor had spent another 5 minutes in the conversion room before they'd left to carry out their search. As they'd gone deeper and deeper into The Mondasian Complex, The Dalekanium side of the dial received more attention from the needle of the detector, but aside from that single Cyberman, they hadn't seen any of the silver giants. The Doctor was worried about that, but considering how scarce the resources of the planet were in its current state, he wouldn't be surprised if The Cybermen only had a limited number to maintain and monitor the city whilst the others were in suspended animation. It was an old practice of The Cybermen back in the day in order to conserve energy.

Then they'd found The Dalek Timeship deep inside the complex in a fairly empty warehouse storage room. It wasn't a DARDIS capsule, it was a ship with the traditional flying saucer design, only it was much smaller and compact. "Yes, it also means there could only be a small group on Mondas," The Doctor whispered from their hiding place.

"Can't we tell how many there are?"

The Doctor shook his head, "That thing is made from two different grades of Dalekanium. The detector wouldn't be able to tell which was the ship and which was an actual Dalek. You know, the more I see this, the more I'm convinced that this is a trap. I won't know for sure until we've gotten inside."

Lorna was instantly alarmed. "We can't-"

"How else are we supposed to find out what The Daleks plan to do? We only have a basic idea of their plan, but not the finer details. Come on, we can debate safety later."

The Doctor tried to walk confidently towards the saucer's airlock, but deep down he was as worried as Lorna. Much to their surprise the door opened without any trouble. No booby traps, no weapons threatening to burn them to molecules. Lorna blinked as she walked with him, past the gleaming metallic architecture. "Very metallic," she whispered.

The Doctor nodded in agreement, deciding not to say anything before they arrived in the control room. "This thing is more like a fighter than a starship, but look over there," the Doctor pointed a hand towards the computer bank. It was attuned to The Mondasian Central Computer Network, giving The Daleks eyes and ears for monitoring the entire city.

Just looking at the monitor and the camera footage shown on the screens gave Lorna a nasty thought, he could tell what it was but he had guessed it already. "The Daleks must know that we're here," she said, trying and failing to hide her panic. But The Doctor ignored her fear, it was nothing new to him to find Daleks spying on their surroundings but he was more interested in the object on the other side of the small control room. It was a sphere surrounded by four diamond shaped plates.

"What is it?" Lorna asked quietly.

"A temporal phase shift generator. It can be used to shroud a body, like a ship or a planet in a bubble of time, pushing it into a small pocket universe. The Daleks used one to safeguard Skaro when I used The Hand of Omega to destroy that systems star."

Now Lorna knew what it was, she quickly grasped what the Daleks planned to do. "And they plan to use it for Mondas? But why?"

Another piece of the puzzle was falling into place. "Lorna, I think I'm beginning to understand-"

"DOCTOR-YOU UNDERSTAND OUR OBJECTIVE?"

The Doctor turned around slowly. A single Dalek stood in the room in the same doorway the Time Lords had walked through, but this was a different Dalek from the ones usually sent to fight, and to die, on the front. This Dalek was slightly larger, with an enlarged grille section which glowed a soft but metallic blue-silver light, with two large rings crossing it horizontally and vertically. The Dalek's color was blue, but aside from the enlarged grille section and the rings it was little different from the other Daleks except it was putting out a subtle temporal aura.

"A Dalek Time Puppet Controller," the Doctor whispered. He'd encountered these special types of Daleks like this one before. They were a result of the Dalek's earlier attack on Gallifrey, far more effective than The Vardan and The Sontaran Invasion many Meta-Centuries before (The Doctor had learnt that The Daleks had subtly manipulated both races into conducting The Invasion of Gallifrey in order for them to study the defenses of The Time Lords), and they had raided The Matrix and stole many of The Time Lords Secrets. One of them was knowledge that very few Time Lords knew. When Rassilon and the early Gallifreyans from The Dark Times became The Lords of Time in one of the many contradictory timelines of The Dark Times, they had been exposed to temporal energy from The Eye of Harmony. Meta-Centuries later, Rassilon admitted that after creating the Imprimature that it was possible that lesser species could be elevated in the very same way as us. Daleks didn't like being considered lesser, but it had given them an idea to help them bridge the gulf between The Daleks and The Time Lords, and hopefully give The Daleks better knowledge and understanding of space-time. So they used a combination of genetic engineering, taking embryos and exposing them to energy from Taranium and vortex energy to create time sensitives. Each generation was improved, and with their time sensitive nature they helped guide The Daleks into making greater strides in bridging the gulf separating The Daleks and The Time Lords. They still had a long way to go, but with their Eye of Harmony and continuous experiments made with the use of stolen or acquired knowledge of temporal engineering, it was only a matter of time, but the Time Puppet Controllers were still a formidable force with their time sensitivity and their casings designed to tap the vortex into making them more temporal sensitive.

Couple this with the fact that they were one of the many elite officers of his greatest and relentless archenemies.

The Dalek Time Strategist.

That, and they were based and modeled on another one of his archenemies.

The Dalek Time Controller.

"Makes sense for one of you to be here, alone," the Doctor said, placing emphasis on the last word.

"Alone?" This was news to Lorna.

"This ship's too small for a squad of Daleks, but even if The Puppet Controller had two assistants to help it, they might make a mistake which could jeopardize their entire mission. Besides, Dalek Time Puppet Controllers are more than capable of performing commando missions of their own," the Doctor explained.

"Correct, Doctor, I am alone. The Dalek Emperor has assigned many of my kin to the frontlines to match the Time Lords, but many of us are sent on missions to affect history alone."

"Don't let me stop you gloating, but before you threaten to exterminate us, why Mondas? You know enough about the Web of Time to know that if Mondas is not destroyed, it risks causing massive damage."

The Dalek Time Puppet Controller glided into the room, making Lorna take a hasty step back. The door closed behind it, trapping them with the Dalek. "IT IS THE ONLY WAY, DOCTOR," the Controller said, "FOR SOME AMOUNT OF META-TIME, THE DALEKS AND OUR ALLIES AND THE TIME LORDS AND THEIR ALLIES HAVE BEEN FIGHTING ACROSS THE MULTVIERSE. EVENTUALLY AND INEVITABALY, IT WILL RESULT IN AN ETERNAL STALEMATE."

The Doctor agreed with The Dalek, he just wasn't going to admit it. "So you've decided to alter history? Bit risky, isn't it not? But when I think about it, Mondas makes a lot of sense; Mondas's journey allowed civilizations to rise and flourish, and when it was destroyed, empires and federations rose and fell. But surely there are less tricky events that you can meddle in?"

"YOU SPEAK OF MEDDLING, DOCTOR, AND YET IT WAS YOU AND THE TIME LORDS WHO MEDDLED AT THE MOMENT OF OUR CREATION. YOUR PEOPLE BEGAN THE TIME WAR WITH YOUR ACTIONS. WE ARE MERELY ENSURING THAT OUR RACE SURVIVES. AND YOU ARE CORRECT, THERE ARE LESS PROBLEMATIC EVENTS IN THIS UNIVERSE WHICH CAN CAUSE ENOUGH TEMPORAL DISRUPTION. BUT THAT IS NOT ENOUGH, FOR THE AXIS WAR EFFORT TO CONTINUE AS PLANNED, WE MUST DESTABILIZE THE DOMAIN OF THE TIME LORDS."

"You'll never do it," Lorna interrupted, "The Time Lords will stop you-"

"What do you plan to do with Mondas anyway? The Daleks and The Cybermen have never gotten along as History has shown and dictated, if several Cyber-Dalek Wars were anything to go by, so why save Mondas?" The Doctor asked in order to try to get to the point of The Dalek Xanatos Gambit Plan - at first he'd thought that The Daleks were just trying to alter history once again just like always, but there must be more to it than that, after hearing The Puppet Controller speak.

The Dalek was silent for a long while, making both Time Lords nervous. "THE DESTRUCTION OF MONDAS HAD SEVERAL EFFECTS, DOCTOR. IT DEPRIVED THE CYBERMEN OF A POWER BASE. THE CYBER CONTROLLER OF THE FUTURE WAS CORRECT – DESTROYING OR DISRUPTING EARTH DURING MONDAS'S ATTACK IN THE YEAR 1986 WOULD HAVE SAVE IT – BUT WHILE THE EXECUTION WAS CRUDE AND INEFFECIENT, IT WAS SOUND. IT ALSO ALLOWED CIVILIZATIONS TO RISE AND FALL, EARTH ITSELF HAS FORGOTTEN THE INVASION UNTIL MANY DECADES LATER, BUT ITS EFFECTS WERE VISIBLE ON EARTH'S TECHNOLOGY AND WOULD ALLOW THE HUMANS TO TRAVEL INTO SPACE."

"And you want to reverse all of that?" the Doctor growled. "You want The Cyber Race to still have its home, and destroy numerous species in turn?"

"CORRECT. THE CYBERMEN WILL HAVE THEIR POWER BASE, AND WITH SOME OF THE SURVIVING POPULATION OF EARTH, THEY WILL HAVE THE MEANS TO EXPAND FURTHER AND FURTHER INTO SPACE WITHOUT THE NEED TO COTINUOUSLY FIGHT IN THEIR WARS. THE CYBERMEN HAVE ALWAYS BEEN A RACE ON THE DECLINE, DOCTOR. TOO MANY TIMES HAVE THEY BEEN DRIVEN OFF, DESTROYED, THEIR ARMIES AND SHIPS ARE GONE BECAUSE THEY HAVE GAMBLED WITH THEIR OWN RESOURCES ON ONE SINGLE ATTACK WHICH WAS A TACTICAL ERROR ON THEIR PART."

"You would be affected as well, didn't you think of that?" Words couldn't begin to describe how angry The Doctor was. "How many times have you lot have tried to conquer the Earth? What kind of reception would you have during your first invasion of Earth, one cybernetic species meeting another? How would that affect your invasion plan?"

The Dalek didn't even seem to care but the Doctor wasn't surprised. The abomination of nature rewritten had another bombshell to drop. "THE DESTRUCTION OF MONDAS WILL HAVE ANOTHER AFFECT, DOCTOR. ON YOU."

The Doctor stepped back.

No, it couldn't be saying….. Yes, it was.

"My first regeneration," he whispered hoarsely. "So, you know?"

"COME NOW, DOCTOR, SURELY YOU SHOULD NOT BE SURPRISE FOR YOU MUST KNOW THAT YOUR TIMELINE HAS BEEN MAPPED OUT FROM TOP TO BACK FOR WE HAVE STOLEN MANY RECORDS FROM THE TIME LORDS DURING OUR SPACE-TIME RAIDS ON GALLIFREY. YOU WERE ON THE LIST OF VITAL INFORMATION THAT WE WOULD TRULY NEED FOR THE TIME WAR ITSELF FOR OUR TIMELINE AND YOURS ARE LINKED TOGETHER."

Lorna looked at him, her eyes wide in fear. "Doctor-"

But the Doctor didn't want to hear what she had to say. "Get rid of that, and you'd rip my timeline to shreds," he said.

"AND MORE," the Dalek added. "YOU WOULD STILL REGENERATE, DOCTOR. MONDAS'S PROXIMITY AFFECTED YOUR REGENERATIVE PROCESS, AND THE ENERGY IMBALANCE ACCELERATED THE PROCESS. WITHOUT THAT FACTOR, YOU WOULD HAVE REGENERATED LATER."

The Doctor swallowed down his own fear. He hated it when The Daleks had well thought out schemes. But then he realized something that The Time Puppet Controller wasn't saying. "You've got something else in mind for me, right? Admit it. You wouldn't have included that little tag on about my first regeneration like that."

"YOUR TARDIS WILL BE REDIRECTED TO VULCAN, AS SCHEDULED. BUT YOU WILL BE SHOT BY A DALEK AGENT, AND YOU WILL BE INJECTED WITH NANOGENES. YOUR BODY WILL BE PREOCCUPIED WITH THE REGENERATION, BUT THE NANOGENES WILL COMPEL YOU TO LEAVE. I HAVE ALREADY MADE THE TEMPORAL PROBABILITY CALCULATION – YOUR ABSENCE WILL ALLOW THE LESTERSON MORE TIME TO LEARN MORE ABOUT THE DALEK FACTORY SHIP WHICH HAD CRASH LANDED CENTURIES BEFORE. THE DALEK ARMY WILL GROW AND EXTERMINATE ALL HUMAN LIFE ON THE PLANET, OPENING ANOTHER SPACE-TIME FRONTLINE."

"I see a flaw in your plan - there would be humans on that planet, and Mondas's survival would mean humanity will be destroyed or turned into Cybermen."

"WE ARE ISOLATING KEY EVENTS IN DALEK HISTORY FROM THE MAIN TIMELINE."

Lorna shook her head. "That would take a vast amount of power."

The Dalek did not elaborate, but The Doctor was still trying to work out on what else it was that The Daleks truly wanted. Then it came to him. It was like Faction Paradox all over again. "You're going to try to make me one of your puppets, aren't you?" he whispered, making The Time Lady look at him in horror as though the transformation was already taking place. The Doctor's hands went into his pocket….

"YOU ARE OUR GREATEST ENEMY, DOCTOR. THE DALEK RACE OWES ITS STRENGTH TO YOU. WE HAVE GROWN STRONGER AND STRONGER IN OUR FEAR OF YOU. THE TIME LORDS DID THE DALEKS A SERVICE IN A WAY WHEN YOU WERE SENT TO SKARO AT THE POINT OF OUR CREATION. WITHOUT THAT ATTEMPT ON OUR EXISTENCE, WE WOULD NEVER HAVE TRULY UNDERSTOOD THE DEVASTATING POTENTIAL OF TIME TRAVEL. WITH YOU UNDER OUR CONTROL, THE DALEKS WILL OVERRUN THE TIME LORDS TO THE POINT WHERE AND WHEN THE SPECIES WILL EITHER BE ENSLAVED OR EXTERMINATED-"

The Dalek Time Puppet Controller faded out of existence. Lorna jumped out of her skin, her time senses telling her that the Dalek had once existed but no longer did. She turned to face the Doctor, and saw him put away an oddly shaped gun. Lorna recognized it and gasped in horror. "A demat gun?"

"Yes. Smaller and not as efficient as the one first devised by Rassilon, but it works. Don't look at me like that - Rassilon ensured Demat guns were allowed for the frontlines, and he even fitted a computer program that prevents a Time Lord from going too mad with power." The Doctor put it back in his pocket. He hadn't used the weapon too many times, in fact he didn't want to use it but he would if he had no other alternative. "The gun wiped that particular Puppet Controller from existence, but the other Puppet Controllers will know what's happened to their friend and will probably try again."

With The Dalek dead, The Doctor checked the computers and nodded when he found what he was looking for. "The Daleks have a temporal reflector net prepared around Earth. They're just waiting for a signal from The Puppet Controller. That's easy enough to deal with, and then there's their ship which will send Halley's comet into Earth. They're using a warp pulse generator to do the work. Again, they're waiting for the puppet controller's orders."

"How are you taking this so calmly?"

The Doctor glared at her. "What, you mean the threat to The Main Homeworld of Gallifrey, The Threat to our Multiverse Cluster, My Timeline? What's to take calmly? I'm furious. I'm angry with The Time Lords and their amazing security, I'm angry with The Time Lords for not bothering to put our biodata DEs in a different matrix to prevent people stealing them. I've seen it before and after far too many times to even count. But what really makes me angry is that The Daleks have come up with a truly long and well thought out plan. The Daleks could have just targeted the Cybermen, but no. They had to include me in their plans, and who knows what kind of anomaly that might cause to The Multiverse as a whole considering I have crisscrossed so much into the timelines of others?" The Doctor sighed wearily. "The Time Lords will love this."

"….and so we travelled to The Dalek ships where the temporal reflector net was being generated and destroyed them using the Time Puppet Controller's Codes, and then we proceeded to the assault ship where the warp pulse would send Halley's comet into Earth. After that we stayed in the local time zone and observed Mondas's approach to Earth whilst ensuring my original incarnation arrived just as scheduled for any further Dalek interference. The Daleks seem to have sent just a small group back through time to the point where and when Mondas was destroyed."

Pausing for a second to rally anymore of his thoughts, The Doctor studied the stony expressions of The CIA operatives sitting across the table from him. They had just sat there, like statues, and simply listened as he spoke. Neither of them took notes, but then The Doctor knew that in The CIA, everything was recorded. He should know considering he worked for them in his second and third incarnations.

For a while. the three Time Lords went silent, but then one of The CIA Operatives spoke, "Was there any further interference from The Daleks?"

Knowing that they were going to take apart the timeline anyway and scrutinize it with a fine tooth comb, The Doctor guessed that the question itself was a mere formality. "I didn't see any such interference," he admitted, "but it's possible that The Daleks will try something. They went for Mondas because it was a perfect target; a fixed event, the homeworld and the focal point for Cyber History, its departure, journey, and destruction shaped the rise and fall of countless civilizations. If it was saved, then The Cybermen would never have needed to become nomadic and The Human Race would have needed a little longer to achieve spaceflight and eventually reach the distant stars, but I think that The Daleks planned to use Mondas's destruction to shatter The Web of Time, weaken our domain, but to open more space-time battlefronts with the destruction of empires and cultures which would have resisted them. But I think, and I believe you should check, that The Daleks had planned to use The Cybermen as foot soldiers against us."

The two CIA agents faced each other. The Doctor knew his recommendation would be followed up. It had to be; The Time Lords could ignore many things, but not the deliberate attacks on fixed events.

And then, the question he had been dreading came at last.

"Doctor, The Daleks planned to infect your first self with a nanogenic virus which they hoped would warp and alter your timeline," the operative asked, "do you believe they will try again, with you and other Time Lords?"

The Doctor had to hide his attempt to swallow. It wasn't a good move to show any kind of fear when it came to the Celestial Intervention Agency and they would capitalize on it. "It's possible," he admitted. "The Daleks have made contact with quite a few of our people - The Monk, The Master, Romana, my granddaughter, and a few others."

"We shall check the timelines and check for any interference. You may go."

The Doctor left the room, more than happy to go. But inwardly he was worried. The Time War had taken a different turn and it would likely get worse from this point.

ED Song:

Kono Yo no Hate de Koi wo Utau Shoujo YU NO Ending 2 Full

Characters:

The War Doctor – A: John Hurt

Rassilon – A: Timothy Dalton

The Dalek Time Puppet Controller - A: Nicholas Briggs