Legacies (short story)

Two weeks later, the British Army have abandoned London and the Great Intelligence's webs have sealed much of the city off as far as Croydon. Yetis and controlled human forces are spreading the web across South England, people are being taken over by the thousand, and an advance north is expected soon. Unknown to the humans, the web's apparently random progress is down to the Great Intelligence seeking for companions of an old enemy in the hope of learning how to use his time machine.

Before leaving London, Colonel Spencer Pemberton had shot a strange little man he'd assumed was a civilian traitor. Acting on intelligence from a Scottish lad, General Hamilton has ordered a machine to retrieve the dead man's police telephone box: the lad and a girl were sent with a group of the Prince of Wales's Own, while Colonel Spencer Pemberton goes in after with the remnants of 1 Para. At Hill View Road, however, Pemberton's A Company is attacked by Yeti in pursuit of the girl and he orders a fighting retreat to a high rise. Captain Knight, the girl, and various soldiers are cut down under the Yeti assault, and the existing plan is no longer viable. They have to switch to attempting to find and kill the Great Intelligence's current host: Anne Travers.

Meanwhile, the reduced Royal Green Jackets 5th Battalion see the webs have now engulfed the Cornish town of Bledoe. Captain Reginald Edwards orders two groups to enter, one containing the rising star Rifleman William Bishop. Once in the village, Bishop spots two possessed people restraining a third: the first example seen of someone resisting the web. The Green Jackets rescue Owain Vine, at the cost of several members and having to gun down possessed humans, and transport him to Strategic Command HQ at Fugglestone. Unfortunately their convoy is intercepted by the Great Intelligence's forces and Vine captured: the Intelligence knows Vine is an earlier incarnation of the man who will become it, and hopes to merge with him to become whole.

On the verge of victory, the Great Intelligence is confronted by "Tessa", the avatar of the old enemy's time machine. When the Intelligence attempts to seize control of her, it is shown a glimpse of itself existing simultaneously across time and space, its various faces and names an imprint of the same being. Tessa convinces it to let her restore the timeline to its original path, as in this timeline the Great Intelligence will remain trapped on Earth and the two presences cancel each other out.

Tessa visits Pemberton to let him know that he has to die in the true timeline but his family line will go on, intertwined with the Lethbridge-Stewarts until they intermarry. To ensure this, Pemberton goes back two weeks to shoot the Yeti that will kill Lethbridge-Stewart (at an angle that will appear like the colonel fired).

In the restored timeline, in late March, Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart pays a visit to Pemberton's family.

Characters

References

The opening scene is a partial rewrite of a scene from The Forgotten Son, where Lethbridge-Stewart evacuates young John, but continues with the colonel's death where the original ends with him firing on the Yeti.
"All the reserves had been called in" for the Green Jackets; Fifth Battalion was a Territorial Army (reserve) group.
Green Jacket member Williamson remembers fighting with the Green Jackets Brigade in the Korean War, the predecessor of the Royal Green Jackets.
The Great Intelligence has already hunted down a sailor, a secretary, and two educators in its quest to find people aware of the Ship.

Notes

"Norma Ashby" is a pseudonym for Frankham-Allen, referencing Norman Ashby.
Various Doctor Who characters are referenced or appear, but unnamed for legal reasons.
Pemberton is said to be leading "1 Para, the UK's recently formed Special Forces Support Group". The Special Forces Support Group was formed in 2006 (and its core element of 1st Battalion, The Parachute Regiment already existed) but as this story is an alternate timeline, this may mean the group was formed decades earlier due to the national crisis.

Continuity

This story shows what would have happened had both Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart and the Thief died during the course of The Web of Fear.
Anti-tank rockets are effective against the Yeti. Why they weren't used in The Web of Fear is said to be because the trucks containing them were intercepted during that story.
The Great Intelligence learns the truth of its origins; it is the imprint of a multi-dimensional being which exists in many parallel realities, including Yog-Sothoth, (PROSE: Millennial Rites) the Great Old Ones, (AUDIO: The Roof of the World) the Intelligence seen in HOMEVID: Downtime, and the immortal soul which began as James Lethbridge-Stewart and ascended from Mahasamatman. (PROSE: The Forgotten Son, TV: The Abominable Snowmen, The Web of Fear, The Snowmen, The Name of the Doctor)
The events of this story take place two weeks after The Web of Fear, featuring the Intelligence that is contemporary to that story (not to be confused with the future Intelligence which travelled back from The Name of the Doctor) and is concurrent with The Forgotten Son although in a disrupted timeline.
Tessa states Ezekiel Lethebridge-Stuart will be President of the National Trust in the distant year 5.5/Apple/26 (TV: The End of the World) and his wife will be a founder of New Earth.