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Staff Sergeant George Albert Arnold was a senior NCO in the Royal Engineers Corp, 21 Regiment. (TV: The Web of Fear)
Biography
Arnold grew up poor in London and, as a child, he was sometimes forced to steal food due to lack of money. (PROSE: The Forgotten Son)
Arnold was a kindly man but didn't like this to be known among the ranks, and would sometimes affect a harsher manner.(PROSE: Doctor Who and the Web of Fear)
Death
Arnold took part in the fight against the Great Intelligence and its robot Yeti in the London Underground. To the other soldiers, he was seen as a brave and stalwart NCO who kept Craftsman Weams on track. Unfortunately, he was the unwitting puppet of the Intelligence, (TV: The Web of Fear) having been shot in the back early in the fighting (PROSE: The Forgotten Son) and his corpse reanimated and possessed by the Intelligence so it could sabotage operations against it. (TV: The Web of Fear)
In a brief moment of mental freedom, (PROSE: The Forgotten Son) Arnold warned Colonel Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart that it was "as if [the fungus] knew what [they] were up to", (TV: The Web of Fear) but the Intelligence tightened its grip on him soon after. (PROSE: The Forgotten Son) Arnold was finally destroyed when the Intelligence was defeated, his body burned and charred beyond recovery. (TV: The Web of Fear)
Post-mortem
Like many other dead soldiers (including Colonel Pemberton), Arnold was, for a time, interred at the mortuary of St Mark's hospital in Kenton during the clear up following the London Event. His corpse was resurrected by the Great Intelligence and walked out of the morgue, making its way to Bledoe, Cornwall, causing people to zone out and walk in circles as he passed. Arnold possessed some of his memories and tended to think of himself by his middle name of Albert. While he believed he was free and off to fight the Intelligence, he was actually bringing a fragment of it to the rest so it can regain full strength. In the end, Lethbridge-Stewart shot him through the head to defeat the Intelligence. (PROSE: The Forgotten Son)
His body was stored in the Vault's deep freeze. (PROSE: Beast of Fang Rock)
Behind the scenes
- Staff Sergeant Arnold's full name was revealed in the novelisation of the video Downtime, and again in The Forgotten Son.
- In the TV story, Arnold is called "Staff" but the novelisation simplifies it as "Sarge".