Series 1 Episode 8: The Dark Emerald

Janet Wilkinson and her wife Charlotte were having troubles with their marriage. They were constantly at each other's throats, and needed help if they wished to improve it. The truth is they did love each other. They were willing to do whatever it takes to rectify their previously healthy relationship.

Janet's car rolled up outside of a local marriage clinic. Inside, she and her partner seated themselves down in front of another woman. They filled out a number of forms before the session commenced.

The other woman smiled, “I’m Phillis Waterman and I’ll be your assistant for today. I know sometimes we can all go through difficult times in our marriage, but I’m here to help with that. I’m here to make sure that your problems are vanquished and put away forever.”

She leaped out of her seat and shifted towards a table, which was covered by a white sheet. She removed the sheet, revealing an emerald type object. She moved back towards the couple.

“This is the Dark Emerald!” She grinned, “This is the secret to heal wounds, however big or large they can be. It’s the only thing that can stop death-And nobody else knows about it.”

“Is that alien?” Janet asked.

Phillis nodded. “Touch the orb and it may restore your marriage to the way it was.”

Charlotte was stunned. “Alien? You’re saying that piece of junk is alien? You must be kidding me. Aliens don’t bloody exist.”

“Don’t be so naive!” Phillis chuckled, “This could grant you a great deal of help.”

Suddenly, there was a considerable explosion from behind Phillis. A Dalek shifted through the room. It was only a matter of seconds before it exterminated Phillis. Janet recognised it from UNIT HQ and dragged Charlotte down behind the table. Janet grabbed a gun from her pocket and began to shoot it but the Dalek kept resisting these bullets. The Dalek moved towards them. Janet dropped her gun before lifting herself off the floor and raising her hands. The Dalek paused for a moment. Two human figures entered from behind it.

One of them moved towards the Dalek. “Come on, stop! Get back behind the table now, Janet!”. Janet ducked, but did not recognise the man. “This is a Dalek.”

“Who the hell are you?” Asked Janet.

The man grinned. “I’m the only chance of you getting out of here alive. I’m the Doctor. The new one.”

Earlier in UNIT HQ

Matt noticed a person lying on the floor. He checked to see if there was a pulse. He rolled the body over and was greeted by a stranger.

“Are you okay?” He asked. “What happened here?”

“Matt-” The figure responded.

“How do you know who I am? Who are you?”

“Don’t you recognise me,” The man grinned, “I’m the Doctor.”

Matt was lost for words. “But you can’t be. You’re not the Doctor. He was different. He looked completely different. I-”

“That’s what I do. When we die, we don’t die, we regenerate our bodies and change our forms. It’s not that we’re infinite-because there are limitations, but it’s that we are more advanced than you will ever be, or will ever know. You probably won’t believe it is me and there’s probably no proof I can give you that you will believe, but if we stand here talking for much longer the Dalek will escape the HQ and kill everyone in the base. If it hasn’t already, that is.”

Matt grabbed a weapon from a desk and departed the laboratory immediately alongside the Doctor. The two of them hurried through the corridors but there was no sign of the escaped Dalek. The Doctor recognised the faint sounds of extermination so decided to follow the trace. As they wandered through the corridors, Matt was shocked by the amount of casualties caused by the creature. The Doctor was not shocked at all. He knew what daleks were capable of by now.

Eventually they reached the marriage clinic. The Doctor creeped towards the Dalek. He grabbed the sonic screwdriver from his pocket and aimed it at the eyestalk of the creature. He shot at it, impairing its vision.

“My vision is impaired!” It screeched, “I cannot see!”

“Good good.” The Doctor grinned. “Its vision may recover so we’ve got to be quick. We’ve got two options: Blow the Dalek up or take it back to your nice little cell you’ve kept it in up until now. Your choice, Janet.”

Janet shrugged. “I still don’t understand. Who are you?”

“I’m the Doctor, like I said. I also said we don’t have much time so we need to be going.”

Matt put his hand up in the air. “I think we should blow it up. But how?”

The Doctor grinned. He held his sonic screwdriver in the air and pointed it towards the Dalek. They all stepped back as he blew it up. The Dalek screamed as it imploded.

Matt grinned. “Can you do anything without that thing?”

“No. It’s my secret weapon.”

The four of them departed the marriage clinic. Matt and Janet both hurried towards the Doctor-They were bursting with questions.

“How can you just change your face? You can’t be the Doctor.” Janet pondered.

The Doctor glared at her. “We’re very different people to you.” He looked through the window of the divorce clinic and noticed the dark emerald.

Matt stopped him from moving towards it. “Are we just going to ignore everyone who’s died here?”

The Doctor turned towards Matt. “There’s nothing I can do about that. Can the three of you please take all the suitable measures that need to be taken to rectify everything the Dalek has done while I go and find out what that crystal type object is over there.”

Janet, Matt and Charlotte paced towards UNIT HQ. Charlotte pulled Janet back.

“We have no time,” Janet remarked. “I can’t answer questions and do the talking now. We need to sort out these deaths.”

“It’s over.” said Charlotte, “It’s all over. You work here at this UNIT HQ place don’t you? I’ve been thinking for quite a while that you’ve been lying to me, Janet. You told me you worked at the Bakers, and yet every time I went into the bakers you weren’t there. When I asked you, you said that it was because it was your lunch break-but why would you have your lunch break at 9 O Clock in the bloody morning? You’ve been lying to me, Janet, and I cannot deal with that. Our marriage was enough of a shambles as it was, and now you’ve just dug the final nail in the coffin. You’ve lost more than the lives of your friends today: You’ve lost me. Goodbye.”

Janet wanted to run after her but she knew it would be pointless. She knew what Charlotte was like. Their marriage was over.

Inside of the Marriage clinic, the Doctor noticed the body of Phillis on the floor. He noticed a rug nearby her so decided to wrap this around her. Next, he shifted towards the dark emerald. When he touched it, regeneration energy began to release itself from his body. He suddenly felt all the cells in his body rejuvenate once again-just like another regeneration. A few moments later, the regeneration energy stopped. He moved towards a mirror and was pleased with the result: He had de-generated. This crystal had reversed his regeneration.

Inside of UNIT HQ, Janet and Matt searched through the corridors to discover who was dead and alive. They ensured suitable actions were taken that needed to be to sort out what had happened. When they had done what they needed to do, the two of them returned to their headquarters where the TARDIS was located. They placed themselves down on the floor.

Janet became emotional. “I always try to pretend that I’m tough, that I’m flawless, that nothing can break me-but that’s not me, is it? My marriage has just ended, and I cannot pretend that everything is okay anymore. Dozens of people have died and my life is a shambles.”

Matt placed his hand on her shoulder. “Today I lost my girlfriend, had to survive in an alien jungle and almost got killed by an alien warrior race.”

“Okay, your days worse.”

The doors opened from behind them, revealing the Doctor, now with the face that Matt and Janet recognised him from once again.

Matt chuckled. “I can’t keep track of you anymore, Doctor.”

“I think it was that crystal,” Revealed the Time Lord, “It was like it had some kind of effect on me. I regenerated as usual, but it felt different this time. It didn’t feel like I was dying. Instead, it felt like I had just escaped from dying and was living again.”

“So how does that work?” Janet asked. “I mean, you changed your face to something new and then you just changed it back. That’s not possible, surely?”

“Anythings possible with a time lord, Janet. I think we all need to talk.”

The Doctor grabbed the TARDIS key from his pocket and entered, followed by Janet and Matt. Janet was stunned, but was too emotional to express her thoughts of the ship.

“Thank god I didn’t have to change again,” The Doctor grinned, “I’ve got quite used to these clothes. I’m not ready to let go to anything yet. That’s because I haven’t got anything to let go to. Lydia’s gone-”

“About that-” Matt interrupted. “UNIT asked me to test out this new form of teleportation technology. I found myself on this Jungle someplace forced to survive in the wild for a little while. A few hours later, Lydia arrived with these people who were apparently soldiers from the First World War. Some kind of rift opened, and the Tsuraxi entered from it. We hurried over to this desert island, but the Tsuraxi followed us. They slaughtered all of the inhabitants of the desert island. I ran for it through the portal the Tsuraxi had entered through, but Lydia and the only surviving soldier disappeared. I think they went through that rift the Tsuraxi came from.”

The Doctor paused for a moment. “I need some paper.”

Matt grabbed a piece of paper from his headquarters before returning to the ship. The Doctor began to draw something that vaguely resembled a map.

The Doctor looked towards Janet. “Janet, you probably have no idea what is going on here, so here’s a map. Maps always help. This is a map of all the places that relate to the Tsuraxi. There was our first encounter-which obviously must still be to come because when I first encountered them they knew who I was. Then there was the encounter I just said about in my previous incarnation. Then, the encounter that they claim will be my downfall which I haven’t had yet, followed by our arrival on their mothership when I destroyed the last of their kind. But this throws everything out of perspective. We’ve got to figure when abouts the events in the Jungle and the Island occurred in the Tsuraxi timeline-and we’ve got to get to the final result.”

Matt intervened. “Do you really want to witness your downfall?”

“It’s my destiny.”

“Then shouldn’t you let it come to you, rather than chase it?”

The Doctor nodded. He knew he had to find out what the Tsuraxi really wanted with him-And he had many more encounters left to witness.

Janet stepped forward. “Am I meant to know what’s going on here?"

The Doctor shifted towards her. “I know this probably doesn’t make any sense to you. Basically there’s this alien warrior race who gave me a warning, and I need to find out what their prophecy really involves.”

“And the Emerald-”

The Doctor leaped up. “Ah yes the artefact that made me who I want to be again! Matt, could you please grab some gloves and carry it to UNIT HQ. You don’t want to touch it. You don’t want to become a baby again, do you?”

Matt departed the UNIT Headquarters, grabbed some gloves and headed towards the Marriage Clinic. Inside the spaceship, Janet moved towards the console.

“I’ve had a long day, you know. Well, a long everything really. I don’t want to stay here anymore. I don’t want to be near my wife or deal with the consequences of everything that happened. Can I come with you, Doctor? It may seem a bit random seeing as though we don’t know each other that well but I need to escape.”

“We can get to know each other, Janet. I’d love that.”

A few moments later Matt returned to the ship. “All sorted.”

“Janet’s joining me in the TARDIS! Do you want to come too, Matt?”

Matt looked outside of the doors. “Somebody has got to deal with the consequences of everything that has happened here. Somebody has to protect Lydias legacy. But I don’t want that to be me. I want to find out Lydia, rather than mourn her. I’ve got faith that she’s still out there, and I also believe she’s got some kind of link with the Tsuraxi. I mean the tattoo, the travels, the Island. There must be a connection.”

“Well we’re going to find answers. About the Tsuraxi, about Lydia, about everything.”

Janet grinned. “This is going to be one hell of an adventure.”

The doors of the TARDIS closed before the Doctor pressed a number of buttons and the TARDIS dematerialised. He grinned: He had not done this for a long time. Not really. He was set off on a new course-To find answers.

It was only a matter of time before the ship materialised in its next located. The Doctor departed the console and searched the area. The place they had arrived had resemblance to an air plane.

“Oh come on!” The Doctor groaned. “Everywhere there is in the universe and the first place we arrive is an air plane. The Tsuraxi are never going to be here.”

Matt shrugged. “You never know. They could be anywhere.”

“It’s just a game of chance I suppose. The Tsuraxi could be anywhere in the universe, and we’re relying on the TARDIS-the most unreliable thing in the cosmos, to find them. The chances of locating them are incredibly slim.”

A stewardess entered the aircraft, directing a number of passengers on board. Upon noticing the three travellers, she grabbed a weapon from her pocket.

“I’ve never seen a steward carry one of those before,” remarked Janet.

“Who are you?” The stewardess asked. “Why the hell are you here?”

The Doctor slided forwards. “Put the weapon down we mean you no harm. We’re on the search for a few answers and have arrived in the wrong place. We’ll be going.”

“No!” The stewardess exclaimed. “You are a prisoner so you shall be treated like one.”

The stewardess whistled which caught the attention of three nearby guards. They grabbed the Doctor, Janet and Matt out of the area and through a corridor.

“I just want to know where we are,” The Doctor said, “Things like this always seem to happen to me.”

Matt looked around. “This doesn’t look like a plane.”

“No, mate it isn’t.” Revealed one of the Guards. “This is the Colony ship Britannia. We’re sailing through space on the search for a better future."

Janet and Matt looked towards the Doctor. He grinned.

“This is more like it.”

Next Week: A Night in Darkness