Talk:The Fraction

"The Fraction"? Surely Tannis refers to them as "a faction", as in, people who are a member of a smaller group of Time Lords? Casmus, the Doctor and the Minister all self-identify as "Gods of the Fourth", wouldn't that be a better name for those from Death Comes to Time who exhibit the unusual powers? Third Bannerman 17:22, April 3, 2011 (UTC)

You're definitely onto something: I hear the line as

"I've disposed of the Time Lords of the Fraction, the Saints are squashed, the Doctor and the Minister will finish each other off. You are the last, Casmus."Tannis

Which is technically ambiguous. You could read it as Tannis saying that the Saints, the Doctor, the Minister, and Casmus are "the Time Lords of the Fraction". Or you could read it as a list of groups of Time Lords: the Fraction; the Saints; the Doctor and the Minister; and finally (and separately), Casmus.

"Gods of the Fourth" isn't really any clearer. Only Casmus and the Doctor actually call themselves that; the Minister and Tannis also use the Voice, but the relation of that with being a God of the Fourth isn't quite clear. Is being a God what enables the Doctor to resist Tannis' Voice, and/or to use the Voice on the Minister? And what does the treaty of Carselai have to do with everything? It's a shame that the cosmology of Death Comes to Time was never completed!

But either way, more than 10 years later and you're still right that we still need a page for God of the Fourth (right now it just redirects to Time Lord). – n8 (☎) 15:32, 24 August 2023 (UTC)

Not convinced it shouldn't be — unless we start creating pages for all the synonyms of "Time Lords" that have popped up over the years. I'm very unconvinced by any notion that within the DCtT cosmology those are different things. This whole notion that the Time Lords who are seen to use the mysterious cosmic power are a specific fractional group increasingly seems like a fan confabulation to account for the supposed powerlessness of most Time Lords seen throughout the Classic Series, but surely the clear idea is simply that they took their non-interference vows seriously; "why have the power if you can't use it?", etc. I think The Fraction should be rewritten to simply quote Tannis's line, and any notion that the Saints, Minister and Doctor were members of the Fraction should be moved to BTS as merely a possible reading of the text.

Come to think of it, yet another interpretation would be that "the Fraction" is the name of the universe they're all standing in (not necessarily in a "the DCtT-verse is a bottle universe" sort of way mind you, could be a more spiritual, "the physical three-dimensional universe is but a fraction of true reality" sort of thing). By wiping out the Saints, Doctor, Minister and Casmus, Tannis would thus be disposing of all the "Time Lords of the Fraction". Scrooge MacDuck ⊕ 15:36, 24 August 2023 (UTC)

Hmm, interesting. I'll rewrite the page to be less speculative in light of this discussion. And you're right about God of the Fourth, so we can leave it as a redirect and discuss any ambiguities on The Fourth instead. – n8 (☎) 15:46, 24 August 2023 (UTC)