Missy was the 12th Doctor’s antagonist, a version of the Master in female form. Played delightfully by Michelle Gomez, Missy could be alternately cold-blooded and playfully witty. She was different from her previous incarnations in that, in her own, stumbling way, she wanted to regain the Doctor’s friendship.
I wrote “Missy’s Day” during COVID lockdown and found it a very welcome diversion and I greatly enjoyed the writing of it. Follow the link to read it. I hope you enjoy it.
So a few days ago Grego Keith contacted me and expressed interest in having a chat as part of a collection of interviews on the Time Scales YouTube channel. The Time Scales is a website where users can comment on and rate, well, all sorts of things, including Doctor Who TV and audio episodes.
Me being me, I first checked who else Grego had been speaking to. When I saw that the list included Gary Russell, my first reaction was, well why does he want to speak to me? There are a lot of other well known faces there, including Sophie Aldred. My second reaction was to say, sure, let’s chat.
Grego was extremely welcoming and put me right at ease, which was great because I get awfully nervous about this kind of thing. The last time I’d been interviewed was around the time that Big Finish announced “Battle Scars” back in 2019. Before the world changed.
We ended up having a great chat and I thoroughly enjoyed the experience. We covered my writing journey, starting with sketches I would write as a kid, to my fan fiction, to Big Finish, and to the collections of original fiction I’ve self-published. We also touched on the two Alternative War fan audios that were recently released by TT Productions 23.
I hope you give the video a watch when you get the chance. And be sure to check out the other content in the Time Scale’s channel. I’ve just finished the first part of the Gary Russell interview and am looking forward to parts two and three.
“Reprieve” is the second and probably last in the Doctor Who Alternative War series. In the first, simply called Doctor Who: The Alternative War, the Alternative universe diverges from the TV Doctor Who universe when the Eighth Doctor regenerates. In the Alternative universe, the Doctor regenerates into another Doctor, a woman, who meets fellow Time Lord Aliana and sets out to find a way to bring the Time War to an end.
In “Reprieve”, the Doctor has recently regenerated and is now a version of the Tenth Doctor that we know and love. But this time, he’s ginger.
The backstory behind the regeneration didn’t make it into the script, but here’s a synopsis: The Doctor sets out to gain intelligence on Dalek plans by infiltrating a Dalek ship. She is unable to penetrate the Dalek shields with the TARDIS, but finds a way to transmat inside. She finds that the Daleks have been hunting down a so-called Doomsday weapon. Whispers have hinted it is being developed by the Time Lords. Before she can finish, she is spotted by a Dalek and is shot. Meanwhile, Aliana has been furiously working to find a way past the Dalek shields and finds a means that should work just as the Doctor is shot. Throwing caution to the winds, Aliana materializes the TARDIS around the Doctor and they escape.
The Doctor and Aliana have had numerous adventures since the first episode, and Aliana has grown and matured. As “Reprieve” takes place, she and the Doctor have almost reversed roles, Aliana being the steading influence on the impulsive Tenth Doctor of this universe. We also learn of Aliana’s backstory, and how she was able to find the Doctor just at the moment he regenerated on Karn.
As with many of my stories, “Reprieve” is mostly character-based. More character, less running down corridors. And in this story, there are more Doctors than usual. Three, specifically: the tenth, eleventh, and third. Ten and Eleven are played by the ever-brilliant Jack Reeves, and Three is played with love and gusto by the inimitable Jaspreet Singh. As for villains, well, there are three of those as well: The War Master, as well as … well, let’s not spoil it. They’re original characters, so you won’t know them, but as played by Chelsea Lagan and Sam Cybichowski I could listen to them all day.
What else will you find in “Reprieve?” Well, there are loads of references to classic sci-fi and fantasy. And the Third Doctor gets to reverse the polarity and drive some pretty hot wheels.
Really, what else could you ask for in a Doctor Who story? Especially when played by such an amazing cast, and with such great sound design courtesy of the indefatigable Abi Louise, who seems to be a master of just about everything. Basically, Abi and TT Productions 23 are awesome.
The debut of the new Doctor Who (fan fiction) audio play is on Wednesday, July 5th, at 7 PM UK time. Doctor Who: The Alternative War — Reprieve is a light-hearted, multi-Doctor story set in an alternative universe during the Time War.
Hope you’re able to join us and that you enjoy it. We have an amazing cast and a stellar production so I’m looking forward to hearing what you think of it.
One of the reasons for the success of Doctor Who over its nearly sixty years of history is the variety of stories the show presents. The stakes can be small or potentially universe-ending. The setting can be the past, present, or future, or a combination thereof. And within a given story, the tone can change from light-hearted to deadly serious in a pair of heartbeats.
I have a particular fondness for the third Doctor’s era, and as a writer, I enjoy writing in a variety of styles, from serious character studies to light-hearted affairs. Recently, I wrote a light-hearted, third Doctor story called “The Unravelling.” What I was going for here was to provide an amusing, in-universe explanation of why the walls at UNIT HQ were occasionally prone to wobble. And, why it was that the quality of light indoors was quite different from outdoors.
It’s been published by The Doctor Who Project, which posts two kinds of stories. On the one hand, they continue the adventures of the seventh Doctor past the cancelation of the series. These can be considered to take place in an alternative universe. The Doctor has regenerated several times in this universe.
The other stories are tales of the classic Doctors under the umbrella, Brief Encounters. Herein you’ll find “The Unravelling” among many other Doctor Who short stories.
Please give it a read and let me know if you enjoy it. And do check out the other fine stories collected here.
For a long time now, I’ve been itching to take my four-story fan fiction saga that linked the Firefly, Castle, and Doctor Who universes, and combine them into a single volume. It’s called The Time Conspiracy.
It all started back in 2012 with my fanfic story, “Goodbye.” In that story, I introduced time travel to the Firefly universe because—hey! It’s me. After the events of the movie Serenity, Mal and company meet up with someone from their past who should be dead. And they’re not the only ones who have been seeing ghosts. Something is wrong, and it’s up to the crew of Serenity to put it right.
This story led, inevitably perhaps, to a couple of Firefly–Castle crossovers. In “A Firefly in the Castle”, Mal visits Castle’s Earth. In “Castle Serenity”, Castle and Beckett find themselves in the far future and join the crew of Serenity. In these stories, we learn that Mal and Castle are clones, inserted into their respective time streams to nudge events in a direction favourable to the Alliance.
The conclusion of the saga came with “Miranda” in 2016. This story brings the eleventh Doctor and Clara to the Firefly universe to get to the bottom of why the Alliance is meddling with time.
It’s interesting and gratifying to see how my writing improves along the way. And there are other things. The closing scene of “Castle Serenity” is, I think, the most touching thing I’ve written. To this day, it continues to makes me misty-eyed. And from a plotting perspective, “Miranda” is the most complex story I’ve written, telling its story while fitting into the events of “Castle Serenity” and the movie Serenity.
I also have to say that I’ve really enjoyed reading this adventure. I hope you do too.
I was in the mood for some multi-Doctor silliness. This bit of fanfic is the result.
This is a work of fan fiction. No copyright infringement is intended.
From redmangoreviews.com/
“What?” said Ten through clenched teeth.
“Oh, this isn’t good,” said Eleven.
“You’ve got to be kidding,” said Twelve, taking in the twelve figures gathered with him on the grassy hilltop. “We’re all here. Same place, same time. Even Not The Doctor over there.”
The Warrior swiveled his head. “Are you referring to me?” he growled. Then, with a haunted look on his face, he added “It’s true. I’m the Doctor—“
“No more!” Nine through Twelve chorused together.
“Well I for one think it’s smashing that we’re all here,” said Thirteen, who had suddenly appeared. “I mean, dangerous and potentially universe-ending, but totally smashing.”
“Now see here, young lady, ” said One. “This matter is extremely serious. It’s no time for feminine frivolity.”
Doctors Two through Twelve whistled silently, shook their heads, and stepped back a couple of paces. After a moment of speechless silence, Thirteen said, “I … I don’t even know where to start with you. Okay, first off — young lady? Seriously? Next to me you’re a babe in arms. I’m thousands of years older than you, so a bit of respect? Or you might find yourself on Skaro without a TARDIS.”
“Skaro?” said One, gripping his lapels. Her words appeared to have had as little impact as rainwater on a duck. “What’s Skaro, then, hmm?”
“Spoilers,” said Eleven as he adjusted his bow tie.
“Look, enough of all that,” said Three. “We need to address the situation. Might I suggest we begin by attempting to reverse the —”
“No!” chorused Four through Thirteen.
Nonplussed, Three glanced at the other Doctors and shrugged his shoulders.
Two retrieved a recorder from his coat pocket and had just put it to his lips when Six snatched it away. “Don’t. Even. Think about it,” said Six.
As he observed Four playing with a yo-yo, Eight cast his eyes outward. The grassy hill upon which he and his other selves stood rose some 50 meters above the surrounding flatlands. And the horizon ….
Nine noticed the same thing. After making eye contact with Eight he said, “Oi! You lot. Care to guess how far it is to the horizon?”
“That must be about seven kilometers,” said Seven.
“Yes,” said Eight. “But have you noticed the gravity? The horizon suggests a small world and yet the gravity suggests a much larger one.”
“Perhaps this is simply a very dense small planet,” said Two.
“The little fellow may be right,” said One, “but I suspect that something else is happening here.”
“What?” said Three. “Confound it man, just say it.”
“This may not be a planet at all,” said Two. “This might be a pocket universe. Look above us. There’s no sun, so where’s the illumination coming from?”
Eleven turned pale. “I’ve just had a thought.”
“Oh really?” said Twelve. “Well, don’t worry, it’ll die of loneliness in there.”
“Funny,” said Eleven, not smiling. Turning his back on Twelve and addressing the others, he added, “This might not be a pocket universe. This might be a simulation.”
Two’s shoulders slumped. “And here I was having a perfectly splendid nap.”
Five’s eyes widened. “Having a nap you say?” Puff. “Odd.” Puff. “I was napping as well.”
“Look,” said Six, “Why are you always so short of breath?” Shaking his head, he added, “As it happens, the last thing I recall is laying down for a nap.”
It was true of all of them, the Doctors confirmed.
“We really need to put our heads together for this one. Agreed?” Noting the nods from her other selves, Thirteen said, “Contact.”
“Contact,” mirrored the others.
With their thoughts connected, the collected minds of the Doctors reviewed the facts and analyzed countless paths of possibilities, dismissing some, examining others more closely until a thought intruded upon them that was not theirs.
“Oh good, you’re here.”
Releasing themselves from their mental connection, the Doctors gaped at the newcomer. It was a woman, her hair arranged in dreadlocks, dressed in a blue frock coat and waistcoat, kente shirt, with dark trousers and shoes.
Thirteen’s face fell. “Oh no,” she said. The new arrival gave her a wink.
“Do you know this young lady?” queried One. “Is she another one of us?”
“You can just call me … Ruth for now. Thank you all for coming. With your help, I’ll be able to escape this place. We all will.”
“Where are we?” said Ten.
“Who brought us here?” said Eleven.
“And why?” said Twelve.
“The purple man over there was right. We are within a simulated environment. It’s generated by a dying TARDIS trapped within the Vortex. Like a drowning swimmer, it was grabbing for a life buoy, anything to help it. It needed a Time Lord. At last, it detected me, but didn’t have enough energy reserves to transmat me here physically. Instead, it uploaded my consciousness while I slept. The TARDIS created this simulation for me to interact with it. I haven’t been able to help it by myself. Not enough psychic energy. So I suggested that it seek out another Time Lord that I’d met recently.“
At this, Ruth cast her eyes at Thirteen.
“So you are a Time Lord,” said Four.
“That’s not possible,” said Eleven.
“And yet here we all are,” said Ruth with a patient smile. “The thing is, I hadn’t counted on also uploading some of her other selves. So I’m sorry I dragged you away from your sleeping bodies, but when we’ve finished, all of this will seem like an odd dream.”
“Of course, if we fail, if the TARDIS dies while we’re still trapped in this simulation, then we die as well,” said Nine.
“That won’t happen,” said Thirteen. “We won’t let it.”
“The answer seems obvious to me,” said the Warrior. “Set a delayed self-destruct and send our consciousness back to our respective bodies.”
There was silence. “That’s cold,” said Twelve. “Even for you, that’s cold.”
“Is there an alternative?” said the Warrior. “I’d be happy to hear it.”
“We need facts,” said Seven. “How can we access the TARDIS systems?”
“We simply ask,” said Ruth. “Like this.” Looking up and spreading her arms, Ruth said, “TARDIS, please show us your control console.”
A familiar octagonal shape started to appear, but it was blurry, streaked with jagged black and white lines like a CRT display in need of adjustment.
“It can’t stabilize the simulation,” said Ten. “We need to help it. We need to focus all of our concentration on that console.”
The Doctors closed their eyes, faced furrowed with effort, until finally the simulated console solidified on the hilltop.
“Excellent,” said Ruth. “Well done. And now—”
But before she could finish, thirteen Doctors were in a scramble for the console. A shrill whistle from Twelve stopped them in their tracks. “Older and wiser heads, perhaps, eh?” said Twelve, casting a glance at Thirteen.
“Sure,” said Thirteen. “Thanks.” Thirteen and Ruth proceeded to examine the settings and readouts upon the console for several minutes. When they were done, they stopped, made eye contact, and nodded.
“What have you learned?” said One.
“It is possible to save this TARDIS,” said Thirteen. “It needs to regenerate, but can’t. The systems to trigger a regeneration have been damaged. However, with our combined psyches, we could bypass those systems. We just need to pre-program the instructions to first transmit our consciousness back to our bodies.”
“Perfect,” said Five. Puff. “An excellent solution.”
“Are we all agreed?” asked Thirteen. All the Doctors nodded. Glancing at Ruth, Thirteen said, “Good. Now let’s get to work.”
Ruth and Thirteen spent some time programming the TARDIS to return them to themselves just prior prior to regenerating. When it was done, Thirteen addressed the other Doctors.
“Okay, this is the crucial bit. We need to join again and use the console’s telepathic circuit to trigger a regeneration.” Thirteen placed her hands upon the circuit and said, “Contact.”
“Contact,” the others chorused. “Contact,” echoed Ruth.
Opening her eyes, Thirteen sat up. She wasn’t in the simulation any more. It must have worked! Well done us, she thought. She was back in her TARDIS, though the room didn’t look immediately familiar.
Wait a minute. What was this around her neck? A scarf? A very long scarf, in fact. Oh no.
Getting to her feet, the Doctor looked at her reflection in a nearby mirror. She saw a familiar face. Just not the right face. Long curly hair, bright eyes, tweed coat, and, um, she was male again. A female mind in a male body. Well, she wouldn’t be the first. Her eyes opening wide, she realized that meant that he was …. And Yaz was due for a bit of a shock.
Dropping into a chair, she rested her head in her hands and thought, Right. Just another day in the life of the Doctor.
The COVID-19 pandemic affects all of us. Physical distancing guidelines mean we stay at home except for runs to the grocery and drug store. Physical distancing doesn’t necessarily mean social distancing, however. Not completely.
Software such as Zoom, FaceTime, Skype, and others, allow you to interact visually with people from, well, anywhere. Emails, messaging apps, and social media such as Facebook and Instagram also allow us to keep in touch.
It’s not the same, though, is it? Of course, it can’t be, not even if we had Star Trek-like holographic communicators. It’s no substitute for being in the same space with someone. Still, beggars can’t be choosers, and we’re lucky that we live in an age where so many means of communication are open to us.
It fascinates me how Twitter has come into its own during this crisis, and has allowed communities to interact with one another in real time. By community, I mean groups of people with shared interests, no matter where they are in the world.
I often write about Doctor Who, and those who enjoy the show and its spin-off media are certainly a kind of community, one which has been very active these past weeks. Emily Cook (@Emily_Rosina), of Doctor Who Magazine fame, has organized several global Doctor Who watch-alongs. She selects an episode, sets up a time, and everyone starts watching at the same time and can contribute to a Twitter dialog. She’s managed to snag previous showrunners Stephen Moffat and Russell T. Davies, and many cast members, including David Tennant and Matt Smith. TardisMonkey (@tardis_monkey) has done the same with some notable “classic” Doctor Who episodes, including “The Five Doctors” and the upcoming watch-along, “The Three Doctors”.
Lily May Sherratt (@IreneWildthyme) has organized some listen-alongs with content from Big Finish Productions. Among these were the four Paul Spragg Memorial Short Trips, including “Forever Fallen”, “Landbound”, “Last Day at Work”, and “The Best-Laid Plans”, with live Twitter commentary from the authors, including yours truly. Big Finish themselves recently organized a global listen-along to the Eighth Doctor story, “The Chimes of Midnight”.
There are other types of community projects. For example, for the past few weeks, seven authors of Big Finish Short Trips have collaborated on a Doctor Who fan fiction story, one tweet at a time. With a couple of weeks to go, we’ve just topped 1,000 words. Almost surprisingly, the story is working out pretty well. I say “almost surprisingly” because there’s been no coordinated plotting, and none of us has any idea what will come from a given day’s tweet. It’s been a fascinating experiment in minimalistic writing, because you need to keep your word count down while moving the story forward in some way. All in 280 characters. Look out for the hashtag, #WhoFicTweets.
Aside from being an interesting exercise in collaboration, particularly as I’ve never collaborated with other writers before, I find it’s given me a nice feeling of connection with the other writers. And in these times, we can use all the connections that we can get.
I would urge you, if you’re at wits end during this extended period of lockdown, to seek out community members with similar interests and engage in some activity, be it a creative endeavour or not. Don’t disparage the notion of online friends and colleagues. There are a bunch of people that I’ve “met” online, through writing fan fiction or in the world of Doctor Who, and I’ve enjoyed these relationships very much.
There’s many rewards to be had in the social media space. Just, you know, stay away from the trolls.
I’ve increasingly noticed that, when someone doesn’t like what’s been done with their favourite fandom, they might liken the offending episode to fan fiction. And not in a good way. In a dismissive way, in fact, as if fan fiction is something to be avoided at all costs if you are at all discerning of quality.
This is a very facile put-down, and reflects more on the commentator than on the body of fan fiction works. What does the put-down actually mean? What is it about fan fiction that they are referring to? If it’s a perceived bent towards fan service, well, it’s fan fiction, isn’t it? The ending of Game of Thrones angered a lot of people and was considered by some to be a bad idea. (Not unlike the creation of the Universe in Douglas Adam’s The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy). This is because it was not what many fans were expecting or hoping for. Is there anything wrong with that? Are media creators required to take a poll and shape their stories accordingly? I really hope not. The thing is, you can’t have it both ways. You can’t complain when a story goes in an unexpected direction, and then dismiss another story as fan servicing. Fan fiction is all about making stories that fans would love to see. Things like romantic liaisons between characters, and weird and wonderful crossovers. Where else would you see Star Trek crossovers with Harry Potter, or Castle crossovers with Firefly?
Those who treat fan fiction dismissively might be referring to the perceived quality of stories and/or writing. They might say that 90% of fan fiction is junk. In this they would be right. But I refer you to Sturgeon’s Law. Science Fiction writer Theodore Sturgeon famously said that 90% of everything is junk: TV shows, movies, books, you name it. I’ve read some remarkable fan fiction, stories that I wish could have been made into “canon”. And I’ve known some fan fiction writers (*cough*) who evolved into pretty good writers over time. For instance, a Doctor Who fan fiction writer I’ve corresponded with many times, Ichabod Ebenezer, has gone on to win a short story contest and has had a story commercially published in an anthology. His first novel is available on Amazon. Writing fan fiction gives you an opportunity to improve your craft while becoming part of a friendly community.
In fact, there’s a lot to love about fan fiction, so before you use the term in a disparaging way, dive into it a bit. There are thousands of stories available on fanfiction.net and AO3. You’ll find that at least 10% of what’s out there are real gems.
Would someone please tell me what it is about romance novels? I mean, what is it about them that makes people actually want to read them?
My latest Castle fanfic is another light-hearted stab at the genre. There’s a lot of romance in the Castle group on fanfiction.net. Stuff like,
“Oh, Castle!”
“Beckett!”
“Oh, Castle, I…”
“I know. Oh, Beckett, I know.”
Researching the genre a bit, I purchased a popular Harlequin Blaze novel, Thrill Me by Leslie Kelly. I was pleasantly surprised by the opening chapter. In fact, I was hooked by the first three sentences:
Sophie Winchester was skilled at only two things. She could type 120 words per minute without a single error.
And she was damn good at committing murder.
Like I said, hooked.
It turns out Sophie only commits murder on paper. As Richard Castle says, a lot more lucrative, a lot less prison.
She lives in a town called Derryville, a nod to Stephen King’s fictional town of Derry, where Very Bad Things happen. And keep happening. Nice touch!
But all good things come to an end, and we get down to it. The romance part. At the sight of the new sheriff in town, Sophie finds herself weak and dizzy, unable to stand without his assistance, unable to take her hands off him after gripping his oh so manly shoulders for support.
You get the idea.
And people like this stuff? Admittedly, I don’t read a huge amount of romance, but this type of behaviour on the part of the female protagonist doesn’t seem unusual. What happened to the concern one hears about the lack of strong, female characters in movies and TV shows? Are romance authors trying to harken back to an earlier age, in which females waited for their Prince Charming to make them weak at the knees and fluttery in the eyes? If so, what age would that be? Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, I would point out, was published in the late 18th Century. I don’t see the women in that novel behaving like silly, limp dolls. Well, except for Lydia, of course.
How about a couple of strong characters with a complex relationship, buffeted by forces outside of their control, having to make life-changing decisions where no matter what they choose, someone gets hurt? Or is that sort of thing not considered a “romance” novel, but just a plain non-genre novel?
Ah well. In the end, it’s easy to poke fun at the romance genre, but at least its got people reading, and that’s always a good thing.
SelimPensFiction 