Robert Holmes - Doctor Who: The Two Doctors

Disturbed by the time travel experiments of the evil Dastari and Chessene, the Time Lords send the second Doctor and Jamie to

investigate. Arriving on a station in deep space, they are attacked by a shock force of Sontarans and the Doctor is left for dead.

Across the gulfs of time and space, the sixth Doctor discovers that his former incarnation is very much alive. Together with Peri and Jamie he must rescue his other self before the plans of Dastari and Chessene reach their deadly and shocking conclusion...

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Science fiction/TV tie-in

DOCTOR WHO

THE TWO DOCTORS

Based on the BBC television programme by Terrance Dicks by arrangement with the British Broadcasting Corporation

published by

The Paperback Division of

W. H. Allen & Co. PLC

A Target Book

Published in 1985

By the Paperback Division of

W. H. Allen & Co. PLc

44 Hill Street, London W 1X 8LB

First published in Great Britain by

W. H. Allen & Co. PLC in 1985

Novelisation and original script copyright Robert Holmes, 1985

Doctor Who series copyright British Broadcasting Corporation, 1985

Typeset by Avocet, Aylesbury, Bucks

Printed and bound in Great Britain by

Anchor Brendon Ltd, Tiptree, Essex

The BBC producer of The Two Doctors was John Nathan-Turner, the director was Peter Moffatt ISBN 0 426 20201 5

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the publishers prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

To celebrate the tenth Anniversary of Doctor Who, BBC

Television presented a special story called The Three Doctors starring Messrs Hartnell, Troughton and Pertwee.

Ten years later saw the feature-length celebration, The Five Doctors, featuring Peter Davison, Patrick Troughton, Richard Hurndall, Jon Pertwee, Tom Baker and William Hartnell. When I recently invited Patrick Troughton to join Colin Baker, the current incarnation of the travelling Time Lord, for a story entitled The Two Doctors, there was no special anniversary in mind. Therefore what better than this story being chosen as the one-hundredth DoctorWho novelisation?

Since 1973, Target and W. H. Allen have regularly issued ever-increasingly popular versions of the stories from the twenty-two year old series, and how delightful that Robert Holmes has finally been persuaded to novelise one of his own scripts. Bobs honest and witty version is a delight, his embellishments on the original fascinating

especially the Teddy. Heres to the next hundred titles.

Stay tuned!

John Nathan-Turner, Producer of Doctor Who

Space Station J7 defied all sense of what was structurally possible. Its architneers, revelling in the freedom of zero gravity, had created an ethereal tracery of loops and whorls and cusps that formed a constantly changing pattern as the station rotated slowly upon its axis. At one moment it looked like a giant, three-dimensional thumbprint; in the next perspective it resembled a cheap knuckleduster that had been used by Godzilla.

White radiance, blazing from its myriad ports and docking bays, rendered almost invisible the faint pin-points of light marking the distant civilisations that had created Station J7 the nine planets of the Third Zone.

They studied it on the vid-screen, the Doctor and Jamie McCrimmon, and even the Doctor looked impressed. But while he was identifying tempered opaline, laminated epoxy graphite, and an interesting use of fused titanium carbide, the young Scot sought for a comparison from his own eighteenth-century background: twenty castles in the sky, he decided. And yet hadnt the Doctor said...

Just a wee laboratory, eh?

Obviously its grown, said the Doctor curtly.

Wiping his hands on his ill-fitting tailcoat, he turned back to the console and again began fiddling with the vitreous dome that projected from the instrument deck.

That, Jamie knew, was the cause of his ill-temper. He had flown into a rage the moment he had seen it. The device a teleport control, he called it had not been there before... before when?

Jamie struggled to remember. They had been in a strange kind of garden where the grass was purple and there were flowers as tall as small trees. And although sunlight streamed into the garden, somehow there had been a dense wall of mist all around it. Then three men, tall, wearing yellow cloaks with high collars, appeared out of the mist. The Doctor had bowed deferentially so they had obviously been chieftains. After that... nothing. Jamie guessed they had placed some kind of magic spell on him because the next thing he could recall was returning to the TARDIS with the Doctor as cheerful as he had ever known him.

If I make a success of this mission, my boy, he said, it could mark the turning point in my relations with the High Council.

Then he had found the teleport control and exploded with rage.

Of all the infernal, meddling cheek! Dont they trust me? he fumed. Do the benighted idiots think Im incapable of flying a TARDIS solo?

He had ranted on in this fashion for several minutes and, since then, had spent his time sulking and trying to detach the offending device. It gave the Time Lords, he explained, dual-control over the TARDIS.

Privately although he was careful to say nothing

Jamie thought that dual-control might not be such a bad thing. On his own the Doctor never seemed able to get the craft to where he said they were going.

A snort of frustration, rather louder than usual, came now from the direction of the control console. Jamie glanced round to see the Doctor shaking his head.

Unbelievable! he said. Do you know what theyve done, Jamie? Theyve set up a twin symbiotic link to the central diaphragm!

A symbiotic link, eh? said Jamie. Aye, well, I guessed it would be something like that.

The Doctor shot him a suspicious look but Jamies expression was all innocence. Anyway, it would take days to unravel, he said, and I cant spare the time. He turned back to the console and adjusted the controls.

Jamie felt the familiar slight shudder in the deck of the TARDIS. Why have we dematerialised? I thought we were going in.

We are, Jamie. The Doctor gave the minutest tweak to the vector switch. Its simply that I dont want them to spot us on their detection beams.

Why not? I thought you said they were friendly?

Friendly? Theyll probably be overpoweringly effusive!

The Doctor grinned at the thought. There are forty of the finest scientists in the universe working here on pure research, Jamie, and I dont want to distract them. Think of the commotion with them all clamouring around wanting my autograph.

I hadnt thought of that, Jamie said dryly.

Im just going to have a quiet word in private with old Dastari, the Head of Projects. The TARDIS gave another slight lurch and the Doctor beamed. He seemed to have recovered his good humour. Splendid! he said, switching off the main drive. Weve hit conterminous time again.