The Hand of Omega, known as the Omega device by the Daleks, was a remote stellar manipulator, used by Omega and Rassilon in the antiquity of Gallifrey. It had the ability to turn stars into supernovas in order to fuel Gallifreyan time travel.
Characteristics
Appearance
The Hand lay in a dull, bronze coloured, metal box the size and shape of a coffin. (TV: Remembrance of the Daleks)
Powers and abilities
The Hand could manipulate the life cycle of stars. It also had some basic sentience, was capable of levitation and could follow voice commands. It was even able, by order of the Seventh Doctor, to make Ace's baseball bat into a weapon capable of damaging Daleks. (TV: Remembrance of the Daleks)
History
Origins
Omega himself stated that the Hand was literally the hand of Vandekirian, Omega's treacherous associate, which Omega had placed in the stellar manipulator. The name "Hand of Omega" was chosen by Rassilon for political reasons. (AUDIO: Omega)
Rassilon and Omega worked on the project together, (TV: Remembrance of the Daleks) with some involvement from the Other. (PROSE: Remembrance of the Daleks) While telling Ace about the Hand, the Seventh Doctor hinted that he had also participated in its creation; (TV: Remembrance of the Daleks) one account tells of the Doctor as a reincarnation of the Other, thereby offering an explanation for this curious statement. (PROSE: Lungbarrow)
Acquisition by the Doctor
The Hand was hidden by Rassilon, but escaped. The ancient alarms left by Rassilon were not known and could not be shut off, leaving the Hand to lurk around the rooms of the First Doctor, whom the Hand remembered as the Other. (PROSE: Lungbarrow)
During a period of violent unrest on Gallifrey, the Doctor made off with the Hand, rather than have it fall into the clutches of any of the factions. He subsequently began his self-imposed exile with Susan. (COMIC: Time & Time Again)
According to another, contradictory, account, the First Doctor acquired the Hand of Omega when it was given to him by his seventh incarnation. (PROSE: Echoes of Future Past)
When the Doctor returned to London in November 1963 to collect it during his seventh incarnation, it lay in a funeral parlour.
The Doctor was setting a trap for the Renegade and Imperial Dalek factions and the Imperial Dalek leader, Davros. Davros had hoped to use the Hand to transform (TV: Remembrance of the Daleks) the second sun of the Dalek homeworld Skaro, (PROSE: The Stranger) turning it into a power source for time travel. However, the Doctor had altered the Hand's programming. Instead of enhancing Skaro's sun, it went supernova, vaporising Skaro and presumably the Daleks themselves. The Hand of Omega returned to Gallifrey afterwards. (TV: Remembrance of the Daleks)
After defeating WOTAN on 20 July 1966, the First Doctor checked to see if the Hand of Omega had been buried in Shoreditch Cemetery as per his instructions, only to discover that it had been removed. He determined that his future self would arrive at an earlier point in order to deal with it. (PROSE: The Rag & Bone Man's Story)
The Dalek Prime later claimed that the sun which the Hand had turned supernova was not Skaro's, but Antalin's, a decoy planet. (PROSE: War of the Daleks)
According to rumours, the enemy destroyed the Hand of Omega at the start of the War in Heaven. (PROSE: Alien Bodies)
Other universes
In an alternate universe, there were two Hands of Omega. (PROSE: The Infinity Doctors)
Behind the scenes
- A scene which shows the Other present during the creation of the Hand appears in the Remembrance of the Daleks novelisation, the first ever work to mention the Other in any media, although the production team had already conceived of the character when working out the Doctor's backstory. This reference contradicts known information about the Minyans, who, by implication, destroyed their civilisation after an encounter with the Time Lords, rather than the Gallifreyans.