Doctor Who and The Accusation by Richard J Peat
Episode 1;
The Doctors TARDIS receives a message comprising of just ‘Hurry’, a set of co-ordinates and two Gallifreyan letters. On seeing the letters the Doctor quickly sets the co-ordinates despite Peri’s warnings of a possibility of a trap. The Doctor refuses to tell her anything except that “All will be revealed”.
We now witness a trail on Gallifrey in front of the Lord President (This is not post ‘Five Doctors’ Gallifrey but pre-Doctor Who. The Doctor at this time is but a student at the Gallifreyan Academy, but that will be dealt with later). All is darkness in front of a huge white screen. A voice speaks up, “Lord President, I have arrived here, breaking the laws of time in order that they may be enforced. I am here so that you may prevent the damage that will be done to the past and the future, the destroying of histories of many races who, under Gallifreyan law, should be left to themselves. I present to you the fellow Time Lord who has broken the ultimate law of non-interference. I present ‘The Doctor’. On the white screen is shown the Doctor in all his six incarnations.
Meanwhile the TARDIS lands in a derelict building in a deserted city. The Doctor is distraught by the dereliction and questions to himself, “Why here?”. He starts to frantically search the city with Peri following, complaining all the way.
Back at the trail the ‘Accuser’ is presenting many of the times when the Doctor has affected history, mainly that of Earth. The Doctor is shown on the screen in some of these situations. The Accuser then says that the only way to stop this defiling of history is by completely removing the Doctor from history. At that moment the young Doctor is at the Gallifreyan Academy so they must eradicate the young Time Lord before he has the inkling of ever becoming the Doctor.
Back at the derelict city the Doctor has still not found what he is looking for. Peri is tired and says she doesn’t even know what they are looking for. The Doctor only says “You do know”. She then asks why can’t they locate it from the TARDIS. The Doctor thinks about the suggestion, decides on it and congratulates himself on his intelligent decision and heads back to the TARDIS. They both return to the building but the repetition and symmetry of the building confuses them both, though the Doctor won’t admit it. But then Peri finds the TARDIS. The Doctor begins to walk towards it then stops. Peri walks up to it and comments on the amount of cobwebs that have accumulated around the craft. The Doctor then congratulates himself on finding what he was looking for. The Doctor enters the TARDIS and s confused Peri follows.
The inside of the TARDIS is dimly lit and, much like the outside, full of cobwebs and lined with dust. The Doctor stands for a second then looks at his watch saying “Where is he?”. He then strides to the inner TARDIS door but before he reaches it the door opens and an old, one armed man wheels in in an electric wheelchair. He welcomes the Doctor who stands flabbergasted. The Doctor asks “Are you…?” and the old man replies “Yes”. Peri explodes in her complete confusion and asks who the old man is to which the Doctor replies, “He’s me, he’s my future”.
Episode 2:
The Doctor had set the co-ordinates to this planet because the Gallifreyan letters were the initials of his Gallifreyan name. They learn that the old man is the Doctor in his final regeneration and does not have long to live. On seeing Peri the old Doctor becomes very emotional and remembering the rest of his assistants makes him burst into tears. The younger Doctor is anxious to find out why he has been called to witness his own death. The old Doctor says he has been on this planet since just after his seventh regeneration, the TARDIS being inoperable. Only by using his own Time Lord power grown through the culmination of a nearing of the death of, in essence, twelve people in one could he get the message to his former self. The Doctors job is to return to Gallifrey at a time when he was still at the Academy and stop himself from becoming a renegade. The old Doctor presents himself as evidence for what will happen to him if he does not. Only the Doctor could talk the Doctor out of doing anything. The old Doctor gives his reason for choosing his sixth regeneration as he believes he could most easily put his young, first incarnation self off from leaving Gallifrey, though he makes him believe because he is the better at persuasion. The younger Doctor says why shouldn’t he just go to Gallifrey and become President. The old Doctor finally says that there is something else he would prevent. He tells the younger Doctor how he came to be in such a place. He took the role of President in his seventh regeneration but the Doctor being the Doctor went to help the civilisation of this planet. While the Doctor was there a mutiny arose among the Time Lords through those who did not wish for a renegade to rule them. The civilisation on this planet was wiped out by the mutineers using power from the Eye of Harmony but through an uncontrolled feedback of energy Gallifrey was also devastated and the Time Lord race wiped out. The Doctor only just survived but was seriously crippled with further regenerations only making it worse and the TARDIS made inoperable. While telling this it is obvious the old Doctor is weakening and then dies. The Doctor and Peri quickly leave the TARDIS as it starts to dematerialise. The Doctor guesses that as the old Doctor was still connected to his TARDIS that his death has propelled it into infinity, unable to rematerialize again. The Doctor, highly moved by having seen the fate of one so great as himself sets course for Gallifrey, pre-Doctor.
On Gallifrey the Accuser says his evidence will be there soon in the shape of the Doctor himself, who under the ‘memory recaller’ will sign his own death warrant. The Lord President asks what the Doctors Gallifreyan name is so as he may be removed from the Academy, but before the Accuser states it the next scene starts.
The Doctor arrives on Gallifrey and leaving Peri behind finds his old tutor Borusa, the Doctor finds this emotionally problematic because of what he knows will happen to Borusa in his future. The Doctor tells all. Borusa takes the Doctor to meet his young self but before they reach there the Doctor is arrested. Before the guards can capture the young Doctor in the next room Borusa has taken him away and hidden him.
The Doctor is put in the ‘memory recaller’ and through recalling the many times he has altered history he betrays himself sentences both himself and his younger self to death.
Episode 3:
Peri, after being left in the TARDIS, gets bored and ventures out to be immediately captured by the guards guarding the TARDIS, also allowing them entrance. The Accuser gets very angry at the student Doctor not having been found and decides to lead the search himself. His fanaticism becomes apparent.
Borusa with one of his students gain’s entrance to the jail and frees the Doctor. A guard finds them and is stunned with apparent glee by the student, who states his wished that the weapon would kill, and then rushes off to check up on the TARDIS. The Doctor is then taken into hiding but forbidden by Borusa from meeting his younger self because of the dangers. Borusa updates the Doctor on the situation and about the Accuser. The student returns and tells them that Peri has been captured, then volunteers to free her as the Doctor is very busy. The Doctor and Borusa agree and then set out to investigate the Accuser and his TARDIS.
Meanwhile the student has again tricked his way into the jail and sets free Peri and is eagerly stunning all in sight.
While this is happening the Doctor has hidden himself inside the Accuser’s TARDIS where he finds bows, arrows, swords, chain mail armour and a bracelet with an inscription stating that the wearer was King Harold. The Accuser is none other than the Meddling Monk in another regeneration.
The student and Peri have gone to see Borusa who tells them that the Doctor has gone to follow the Accuser. The student guesses he would have followed him to the Accusers TARDIS, so the student and Peri decide to follow on, while Borusa says he will try and talk the council into reason.
The Doctor sets out to search the rest of the Monk’s TARDIS and after a while he uncovers an amazing find, the Doctor’s own TARDIS, in fact the one he’d met his older regeneration in , his dead self. The Doctor enters the now fully lit TARDIS and finds the body of the dead Doctor sitting upright in the wheelchair. Suddenly to the Doctor’s surprise the ‘dead’ Doctor opens his eye’s and begins to talk gibberish. The Monk enters with a control box in one hand and a blaster in the other. He shoots the body of the ‘dead’ Doctor which explodes in a flash of sparks. It was an android programmed with the records of the Doctor stolen from Gallifrey of the Sixth Doctors time zone. The TARDIS was but a machine built to be identical to the Doctor’s. It was all an elaborate trap so the Monk could get his revenge. He wanted to completely remove the Doctor from history, legally and with the endorsement of the Time Lords so needed the Doctor to give evidence against himself or the Monk would have had no case. But as the Doctor has learned too much the Monk says he must now kill him.
Episode 4:
The Monk is about to kill the Doctor when the student and Peri enter, the student stunning the Monk. The Doctor then transports the Monk’s TARDIS to the council chamber where Borusa is trying to make the Council understand that they are breaking their own law by trying to change the future but is losing his case when the Monk’s TARDIS appears. The Doctor come’s out and in confident style presents his own case against that of the Monk. The Doctor gets the Monk to be put under the memory recaller where the council see that where as the Doctor worked for good the Monk worked for bad. The Doctor wins his case when he shares via the memory recaller the number of times he saved Gallifrey from destruction, though when recalling the last incident he makes sure that Borusa is not indicted. The Doctor is set free with all the records of the trial erased to prevent any future confusion. The Monk is sentenced to live in one time zone on a particular planet with a regeneration forced on him and his TARDIS made inoperative, this reminder of what the Time Lords later does to him makes the Doctor want to leave. He says farewell to Borusa who promises to take care of the young Doctor “But of course you already know that”.
The Doctor and Peri return to his TARDIS and eagerly leave Gallifrey. The Doctor regrets not being able to meet his younger self but when Peri says if he had done it would probably have put his younger self off from ever leaving Gallifrey if he is to end out being like his sixth regeneration, the Doctor goes off in a huff.
Back at the Academy the class is leaving Borusa’s lecture. The student goes up to Borusa and pointing toward another student leaving the room says;
Student: So he’s the Doctor?
Borusa: He will be, but do not tell, he is oblivious to all that has happened.
Student: It’s a much better name to call himself than the Gallifreyan one he has now. It’s better than the boring one I have.
Borusa: Well, why don’t you think of one of your own (leaves the room)
Student: Yes, I will. Let’s think, something grand, powerful, majestic, masterful… that’s it, the Master.
The End (or is it the beginning?)