Doctor Who: The Twin Dilemma (16 page)

Aside from his groundbreaking work on the revitalising modulator, he also ‘won the coveted Astral-Freed award’ in 2130 ‘for his contribution towards the eradication of space plague’ (this gave him more money to go to more parties). One night, a drunken Professor Zarn entered his revitalising modulator with a bottle of Voxnic. Unfortunately, ‘two things act rather strangely under the influence of Ferrail rays’: ‘the first is Voxnic; the second is glass.’

The molecules of the Voxnic absorbed the Professor’s, merging them into ‘an enormous bottle of Voxnic’ that was ‘discovered by a particularly drunken group of the Professor’s guests, who drank it dry without a second thought.’

SPACE PLAGUE: This ‘was a particularly nasty disease carried by a tiny flea which lived exclusively in the hold of intergalactic balk freighters. [This flea] could leap, vertically, exactly one metre ninety, which by that year was the eye level of the average humanoid male. […] It would then spit a fine, sticky substance into the eye of the chosen host’, causing the victim to ‘become relaxed, friendly and agreeable’, as well as lazy, indifferent, and unable to lie. This last is a particularly bad thing for freighter pilots and their crews, and managed to render most of the space balk freighter fleet inoperable. Professor Zarn managed to breed fleas that could jump three metres, and introduced them to the other fleas, producing offspring that jumped so high it didn’t matter where they spit.

COUNCILLOR VERNE: He is said to have ‘regenerated into the most beautiful person ever to be seen on Gallifrey…so startling in his good looks that other Time Lords wanted to be seen in his company. Soon he [was] elevated to the rank of Councillor by his rich and powerful admirers’. Some said he was ‘as stupid as he was beautiful’, and he ‘was totally unsuited to the world of politics.’ One day, when the High Council was in session, Verne’s supporters expected him to vote a certain way about a delicate issue. Whether by accident or intent, he ‘cast his [vote] for the wrong side, and the motion was lost. […] Whatever the reason, his

[vote] caused inflamed tempers to rupture and a fight broke out, during which Verne was so badly hurt that he was forced to regenerate to save his life.’ He regenerated with ‘a very plain face which housed a voice a full octave higher than is normal for a male Time Lord. And such was its sing-song quality it caused those around him to involuntarily snigger when he spoke.’ This so devastated Verne that he forced another regeneration, but ‘the strain on his system was too much. What emerged was a bent, twisted old man.’ Verne forced yet another regeneration and became ‘an amorphous blob that belched and gurgled.’ He even attempted a final regeneration, but ‘the hideous monster that emerged was ordered destroyed by the Lord President.’

VOXNIC: It’s ‘a delicious alcoholic beverage made from fermented viston seeds’. It is mentioned throughout the novel, and will show up again later in
Slipback
– both the radio play and the novelisation.

CATS: ‘When the whole history of Earth is finally written, it will be shown that cats were the most intelligent creatures ever to have inhabited the planet. The fact they allowed human beings to run things for a while shows their tolerance.’ Professor Archie Smith has one such intelligent cat outside his house, sitting in a flower bed. He not only knows what’s going on with Azmael and the twins, he is aware that it is ‘impossible to calculate the square root of minus three’. Smart cat…

THE TARDIS: The Doctor once told Peri that it has a self-destruct device.

DATING

The Sylvest family’s home is ‘as [visually] pleasing today as when it was first built in 1810, some five hundred years [ago]’; for the twins, therefore, the story takes place around 2300 AD.

LINKS

Although the Doctor’s regeneration is mentioned on his first appearance, we do not see it.
The Caves of Androzani
is roughly recapped on pages 23 and 24. On page 117, in a moment of reflection, the Doctor remembers Jo Grant, Tegan, Leela, Zoe, Jamie, Turlough, Nyssa, Romana, Liz Shaw, and most of all Adric.

• 1 Home Time
  
• 2 The Maladjusted Time Lord
  
• 3 Enter Professor Edgeworth
  
• 4 Mestor the Magnificent
  
• 5 Titan Three
  
• 6 An Unsafe Safe House
  
• 7 The Reunion
  
• 8 Jaconda the Beautiful
  
• 9 End Game, Part One
  
• 10 End Game, Part Two
  
• Extras
  
  • Divergent Continuity
    
  • Divergent Characterisation
    
  • Dating and Links