The Wizard's Guide to Timelords and Other Demons Book 1: The Forgotten War

Arrival Delayed

For the second time in as many days, the TARDIS was in distress. The first time, the Doctor concluded, had occurred when the conjunction of two parallel universes blasted a powerful subspace shockwave out of the rift in the Medusa Cascade, as well as numerous other rifts throughout the galaxy. The TARDIS had simply been in the way and was seriously crippled for its transgression. Ground zero for the incursion was almost certainly the Cardiff rift in Wales, which had clearly suffered from the massive shockwave as well.

This time things were different, however. It had taken nearly a day for the TARDIS' to heal itself so that it was well enough to travel. As soon as the last of the time circuits had been reconnected, the Doctor set a course for the first of the transmat coordinates Captain Jack had sent him. The trouble had started as soon as the TARDIS attempted to materialize at the target location. Something—or someone—did not want the TARDIS to land.

"Who's fighting you girl?" the Doctor asked as he struggled to maintain control of the troubled time machine.

This would be his third attempt to land, and it was evidently destined to have the same lack of success as the previous two. However, this time he hoped the TARDIS sensors would collect enough data to triangulate the source of the resistance.

As soon as the alarms and fierce vibrations accompanying the third failure had ceased, the Doctor parked the TARDIS into high orbit, a safe distance from the earth. He then reviewed the latest sensor readout and was surprised by what it revealed.

"The Moon?" the Doctor said, puzzled. "Why would the Moon want to stop me from landing?"

The Doctor was mystified. The Moon had never previously expressed displeasure over any of his earth landings in the past. He had rather felt that he and the Moon were on fairly good terms. Nevertheless, something about the Moon was not going to allow the TARDIS to materialize on the earth's surface. At least not at the place he needed to be. Furthermore, whatever it was also blocked the TARDIS' sensors, so there was no way to even see what was down there.

Exhilarated by the prospect of having another problem to solve, the Doctor quickly and methodically considered his options:

"So," he said to himself, "how do you stop the Moon from preventing the TARDIS from landing?"

"How do you stop the Moon, which somehow seems to be shielding a piece of the earth with a subspace field, thereby preventing the TARDIS from landing?"

"You can't. It's impossible!" The Doctor replied.

"Well, actually you can if you could hyper-ionize the subspace field", he shot back.

"No, that would never work... would it?"

What followed was a brief, though somewhat schizophrenic discussion between the Doctor and...well...himself. Together, they devised a solution that both felt rather confident about. They...or rather, he would program the TARDIS to land at a future point in time when the Moon was far enough below the horizon to obscure line-of-site, while the sun, simultaneously, was at the proper position in the sky to optimize its ionization of the subspace field. At that point the TARDIS, running at just above its maximum power output, should be able to punch through the field and land safely. Maybe. The Doctor quickly consulted the galactic ephemeris in his head and then, after solving a few equations in the air with his index finger, computed the precise moment to land the TARDIS:

"Thursday, 2:56 p.m.," he announced. "Just in time for tea."

Unfortunately, Thursday was three days away. If he opted to time jump rather than wait, he would risk of missing any significant--or possibly cataclysmic--events caused by the rift that might occur prior to teatime on Thursday afternoon. Ah, but sitting around with nothing to do for three whole days...waiting...bored? The Doctor determined that the risk was justified. As he reached for the lever to activate the dematerialization circuit, the thought occurred to him:

So, what is down there that something on the Moon would want to hide?

He pulled back on the lever and the TARDIS wheezed into action.