Majenta Pryce

Majenta Pryce
Main aliases:	Empee MP 8/1/14/4
Place of origin:	Vessica
First appearance:	Hotel Historia
Appearances:	See list

Majenta Pryce was a companion of the Tenth Doctor. A hotelier by trade, she was notable for being one of the non-humans with whom the Tenth Doctor travelled.

Biography

Majenta Pryce was a green humanoid female from the planet Vessica. Before her first encounter with the Doctor, she was a member of the criminal group the Crimson Hand. She betrayed Wesley Sparks and took all his money, promoting herself to their inner sanctum. She destroyed the Skith Home World, then grew frightened and ran. Her servant, Fanson, wiped her mind so she would forget about the Crimson Hand and Wesley Sparks. (DWM: The Crimson Hand)

Fanson and she ran a successful hotel chain, Hotel Historia. After the Last Great Time War, however, the chain failed as people turned their backs on time travel. Retreating to 21st century Earth, Majenta established another Hotel Historia, using time travel tech of dubious provenance to send paying guests into different time zones throughout Earth history. The Tenth Doctor stumbled onto Majenta's operation while confronting the Graxnix in 41st century London and used the faulty tech to travel back to the hotel.

The Graxnix followed the Doctor and started to kill people at the hotel. Majenta quickly decided to leave with her bills unpaid, but the Doctor prevented her escape. He used her time travel tech to imprison the Graxnix outside time, then ensured she was taken to debtors' jail. (DWM: Hotel Historia)

An apparently coincidental visit to the Thinktwice Orbital Penitentiary in Earth's distant future brought the Doctor back into Majenta's world. The harsh regime and crude psychological methods of the prison left Majenta with little or no memory of the Doctor or her life before their first meeting. The Doctor restored Majenta's memory of him, but could not restore anything else.

Together, they uncovered the truth behind Thinktwice; it was being used by the Memeovax, who fed on the prisoners' memories. When one of the Memeovax tried to invade Majenta's mind, she unleashed a blast of power that destroyed all the Memeovax in Thinktwice Prison. Afterwards, in the TARDIS, Majenta quickly co-opted the Doctor into helping her resolve her memory issues. (DWM: Thinktwice)

After a trip to Stockbridge, during which she met Maxwell Edison (DWM: The Stockbridge Child) and helped the Doctor defeat the Lokhus of the Zytragupten, the Doctor and she arrived at an apparently abandoned house on the edge of the Proxima System. The Doctor discovered a holographic party run by a digitised avatar of Wesley Sparks, founder of Sparktech. As events from decades before replayed in holographic form, the Doctor was astonished to learn Majenta had been a guest at the party as Wesley's best friend, business partner and fiancée. Meanwhile, the real Majenta explored the house. She came upon the real Wesley Sparks, now a desiccated cyborg who had gone insane as he preserved himself with bionic parts, waiting for Majenta to return from "pressing business". He attempted to force Majenta into marrying him, but she was saved by the Doctor and Wesley's avatar, still the dignified host and gentleman he had been. Damaged in battle saving Majenta, the avatar begged Majenta to remember their lives together. Majenta tearfully broke down and embraced the avatar as it died. (DWM: Mortal Beloved)

Still trying to take Majenta to Panacea - a healing world, where the Doctor planned to solve Majenta's memory problems - the TARDIS arrived in Sydney Australia. The Doctor and Majenta were quickly taken into custody by UNIT's Australian branch. Following a suspicious UNIT officer deep into the bowels of UNIT's underwater HQ, she eventually caught up with him in the Bestiary - a hangar space full of UNIT mementoes. Majenta was surprised to find the UNIT officer was her old confidante, Fanson, disguised by a perception filter. She was doubly surprised to find that Fanson was now in the thrall of the Skith Leader, secretly helping him infiltrate the UNIT operation. Majenta was captured by the Skith General's rival forces, who were surprised to find themselves unable to access her mind. The Skith elected her as the perfect pilot for the prototype timeship (or SKARDIS), and converted her into a Skith Queen. While she was in this form, the Doctor convinced her to turn on the Skith and help UNIT destroy their ship. As the Skithship fell, Fanson revealed that he was responsible for erasing her memory to spare her some - as yet unknown - agony. Fanson died from injuries sustained at the hands of the Skith General and the Doctor and Majenta fled. (DWM: The Age of Ice)

Majenta and the Doctor next visited New Old Detroit, a planet in the Proxima System. There they solved the final case of low-life private eye Johnny Seaview and wrested control of the World Bomb from a corrupt Alpha Centauran. The Doctor triggered the World Bomb, transforming the slums of New Old Detroit into a world mapped on his memories of England. (DWM: The Deep Hereafter)

After that, the Doctor took her to see the play The Mousetrap. In the London Underground they found "ghosts" saved by a being known as Mnemosyne. After they defeated Mnemosyne, the Doctor said he was going to take Majenta to Panacea. At that moment, a fleet of ships surrounded Earth and demanded she come out with her hands up. (DWM: Ghosts of the Northern Line)

Majenta and the Doctor tried to escape in the TARDIS, but this failed as Intersol launched a tractor beam, sending Majenta onto Intersol's ship. She was mind-probed by Intersol's computer, Justice and then attacked by her old cellmate, Zed. However the four remaining members of the Crimson Hand arrived, having followed her around the universe. They killed most of Intersol's staff and took Majenta over again. As she was taken over, she teleported the Doctor and his TARDIS in a pocket dimension, but making her Crimson Hand friends believe the Doctor was turned into ashes.

Majenta restored Vessica. It had been a planet of immense poverty; this changed when she used the Crimson Hand to make the planet rich again. The population rebelled against her and she brought back the Doctor. After she did this, the Doctor and she destroyed the Crimson Hand at the cost of Majenta's own life. The Doctor resurrected her and placed her in the restored New Old Detroit. As long as the Doctor remembered her, she would stay alive. (DWM: The Crimson Hand)

Personality

Majenta was confident, resourceful and intelligent. She was also intensely determined; whenever something went wrong, she was willing to do whatever it took to put make it right.

A key part of Majenta's personality was her sense of superiority. She had little compunction about ordering others around or letting them know exactly what she thought of them. She did have a streak of compassion, watching out for those she came to care about.

In a reversal of the usual relationships the Doctor had with his companions, Majenta held that the Doctor was working for her, technically making him her companion, rather than the other way around. After the incident with Fanson, Majenta offered the Doctor the opportunity to leave her employ. With a handshake, however, the Doctor and Majenta agreed to retain their "business" partnership. (DWM: The Age of Ice)

Powers

Majenta had a barrier in her mind, blocking mental intrusion. When Thinktwice originally removed her memories, they didn't seem to encounter it. However, when they tried a second time, they found the barrier blocking them. When a Memeovax breached the barrier, Majenta manifested a mysterious 'shadow-force' from her hand, destroying all Memeovax on Thinktwice. Neither the Doctor nor she knew what this 'shadow-force' was or where it came from.

A certain object of immense power known as 'the hand' followed Majenta as she travelled with the Doctor. It was eventually revealed to be a monstrous device, the Manus Maleficus, which she once had helped control.

Behind the scenes

• Majenta was the first recurring comic companion created by Doctor Who Magazine since Destrii, the Eighth Doctor's final DWM companion.
• DWM doesn't specify when the adventures with Majenta occur in the Tenth Doctor's timeline. They were published at a time when the televised Tenth Doctor was expressing reluctance to travel with anyone in the wake of Donna Noble's departure, but there's no narrative tie to any specific spot. They could just as easily take place after The Runaway Bride, during the teaser sequence to The Lazarus Experiment, during the Doctor's final reward — really anywhere the Doctor takes off in the TARDIS without a companion.