Redacted Distortion

The Redacted Distortion was a psychic virus that affected anyone that ever knew the Doctor. Vastra named this effect the Redaction. (AUDIO: Rescue)

History

When the Thirteenth Doctor visited the Unmarked Purlieus star system with her friends to check if there was life there, she got infected by the virus. This started removing people who knew the Doctor and turned them into ghosts. (AUDIO: Salvation) The Floater witnessed her make this grave error. (AUDIO: Rescue) Noticing what the virus was doing, she broadcast a warning to Earth about those being redacted. (AUDIO: Introducing Doctor Who: Redacted)

Initially the people affected by the virus simple went missing. Graham O'Brien and Ryan Sinclair were among the first to go and were considered missing people. Rani Chandra became aware around this time and contacted Cleo Proctor to try and get her to help with the crisis. The virus also began affecting data containing information on the Doctor, such as the Doctor's voicemail to Cleo (AUDIO: SOS) and forums discussing the Doctor and their blue box. When Cleo and Jordan Proctor went to the Hotel Onyx for answers, Rani revealed that people within the Doctor's sphere are going missing, such as Luke, Clyde, Martha and Jo, and that there are only three left. (AUDIO: Hysteria)

Eventually googling TARDIS would yield no results. When Cleo would talk to Shawna Thompson and Abby McPhail about the Doctor, they would constantly forget who that was. Yasmin Khan's family Sonya and Najia had also gone missing, along with Rani's parents Haresh and Gita.

The effects of the virus appeared to have affected time as well, as Queen Victoria was removed from existence, affecting all the things named after her such as the Queen Victoria Theatre, Victoria line and Victoria station all having their names changed to reflect her status as the "Lost Queen". Cleo later discovered that her brother Jordan also went missing. (AUDIO: Lost)

She's receive a call from Jordan but it would be almost entirely illegible under white noise. (AUDIO: Angels) Miller provided newspaper headlines showing that all the missing persons cases were never reported when previously those papers did report them. He himself was eventually redacted in front of Cleo. (AUDIO: Interrogation)

The files on the Doctor have been corrupted at UNIT as well (AUDIO: Recruits), causing them to lash out in fear. (AUDIO: Interrogation) Kate Stewart having been safe up to this point eventually wound up redacted, leading Petronella Osgood to become the Head of Scientific Research. (AUDIO: Recruits)

In Requiem's zoom call which consisted of about twenty, all of them besides Requiem, Cleo and Shawna remained, with everyone else having ended up redacted. Some of the redacted then end up turning into ghost like creatures. When Osgood uses the Dimensional Bridging Stabiliser on it, they can hear screams. The Thirteenth Doctor hijacked Cleo's laptop to warn her not to touch any of them. (AUDIO: Requiem) At the Powell Estate the residents became ghosts. Monica Proctor became a ghost and nearly tempted Cleo into hugging her as she referred to Cleo by her preferred name, but was saved by Vastra. (AUDIO: Ghosts)

This spread out far and wide across the streets as well, with few survivors being attacked by the ghosts. Vastra described them as being trapped between two planes of existence, "the new and the never-was". UNIT took to the streets to try and deal or contain the threat. Though UNIT ended up being defeated as they were all redacted by the virus. The Floater stated that this world along with every other world that the Doctor saved would fall within hours. A possible solution devised by the Floater was to kill the Doctor, a task he gave to Cleo, Abby and Shawna. Whilst they protest this, Cleo finds herself seemingly redacted (AUDIO: Rescue) but the Floater instead reassured her that she was the only one left and it was everyone else who was redacted.

Cleo eventually gets the Doctor to land by activating UNIT's ghost beacon but can't bring herself to kill her. The Doctor explains the origins to the virus and devises a plan to broadcast herself using a Delta wave augmenter, but the ghosts end up defeating her. Cleo broadcasts episodes of the Blue Box Files podcast but the ghosts got her too, transporting her to the ghost's dimension. They focused on a return to reality and were able to wind up back. They turn the volume on the podcast back up which begins to return people to normality. (AUDIO: Salvation)