Revolutions of Terror (comic story)

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Revolutions of Terror was the three-part premiere story of Doctor Who: The Tenth Doctor comic book series published in 2014. It introduced the Tenth Doctor's new companion, Gabriella "Gabby" Gonzalez, as well as her friend Cindy Wu, who would become a companion later.

Summary

Gabriella Gonzalez is stuck in a dead-end job in her family's New York Laundromat, dreaming of college and bigger, better and brighter things.

So when a strange man with an even stranger big blue box barges into her life on the eve of the Day of the Dead celebrations - talking about an infestation of psychic aliens - she seizes her chance for adventure with both hands.

After Donna's tragic exit, the Doctor thought he was done with new companions. But Gabby Gonzalez is going to prove him wrong... if she survives the night!

Plot

Part one

The day before Halloween, and the eve of Day of the Dead celebration by Mexicans, Gabby is working late at night at her father's laundromat together with her friend, Cindy, when the washing machines simultaneously go into the spin cycle and the wet laundry explodes onto the floor. Gabby sees a sort of a monster-like shadow coming out of the machines, but it evaporates just as Hector walks in stunned by the sight of wet clothes and water everywhere.

Later that day, while Gabby is having an argument with her family and Hector, her sister's fiancé, in the kitchen of their restaurant, "The Castillo Mexicano". At the same time, the Doctor orders some food from her sister. Before he can eat it, he dashes out of the restaurant after receiving a signal on a device of his. Shortly afterwards, Gabby's grandmother claims to have seen her deceased husband's soul writhing in agony in a photograph of him. Hector also sees it for a moment and later, in the laundromat, is accosted by a monstrous figure he describes as "the Devil".

In the city, while following the signal, the Doctor sees people running away screaming in horror for no apparent reason. He sees a baby become suddenly disfigured in front of his mother and her friends, before abruptly reverting to normal when the Doctor's device registers a strong signal. The Doctor advises the mother to lock herself and the baby in their apartment for several days.

As the Gonzalez family watches an interview with the local councillor Ricardo Mendoza on NY1 news, the man himself walks into their restaurant and implores them to attend the celebration of the eve of Day of the Dead tomorrow at the Green-Wood Cemetery. He is worried of the low attendance of the first event celebrating Mexican culture, which he worked so hard to organise.

Having found Hector, back from the laundromat and cowering in the corner in horror, Gabby's father, Miguel Gonzalez goes to check if Hector locked the doors while Gabby takes the subway to her boring night accountancy class.

When taking the subway back from the class near midnight, she hears an ominous announcement. Other passengers run past her screaming, and a monstrous creature walks into the car. It sees Gabby and turns into a horror version of her. Now Gabby is running herself and shouts to attract attention of a seemingly oblivious passenger reading a newspaper. It is the Doctor, who takes her hand and pulls out his sonic screwdriver.

Part two

The sonic has no effect on the monster, and as the train approaches a station, the Doctor and Gabby run along the train until they reach its end. Another passenger is already standing there. As the monster approaches, the passenger jumps off the train to his death despite the Doctor's pleading. The Doctor locks the outer door of the 3 train with the sonic screwdriver right in front of the monster's face, asks Gabby's name and tells her to jump onto the platform not waiting for the train to stop completely. The monster follows them onto the platform when the regular doors open and chases them up the stairs to the turnstile exit from the station. The turnstile is jammed, and the emergency exit is nowhere to be seen. As the Doctor busies himself with his device and the sonic screwdriver, instructing Gabby not to look at the monster, she pulls out a mirror and shows the monster its own reflection. This shorts out the psychic field. The monster turns back into the train guard, who falls down unconscious but breathing. In addition, the turnstile is not jammed anymore and the emergency exist is clearly visible. The Doctor explains that a perceptual filter prevented them from seeing it before. They leave the 45th Street station before anyone can question them. Gabby is intrigued by who the Doctor is, however he leaves for his TARDIS parked in Sunset Park, telling her to lock herself at home for a couple of days and to forget about him.

The next day, on Halloween, Gabby is sent to the laundromat to cover the shift of Hector, who is still reeling from his encounter with the Devil. The streets are eerily empty. On her way to the laundromat, she passes by the TARDIS, tries to knock on the door but gets no answer. She finds the laundromat unlocked, picks up a baseball bat, and tries to find the intruders. The Doctor emerges from the backroom wearing some strange headgear. Not recognising him, Gabby whacks him on the head, damaging the headgear. Apologetic, she still confronts him for breaking in thinking he is a policeman because of the signs on the TARDIS. As he heads to the TARDIS to get replacement parts for the damaged headgear, she follows and, feeling he knows more than he says, Gabby continues her inquires until he admits that he works alone, has nothing to do with the police and introduces himself as the Doctor. In the park, he passes Gabby the headgear with still working ocular circuit, and she sees non-corporeal psi-form natives of Earth who evolved alongside humans, exist in a psychosphere surrounding Earth and feed off human empathy. The Doctor calls them Pranavores. Then she sees other lizard-like shapes attacking Pranavores. The Doctor dashes to the TARDIS to get a replacement psychic comms booster for the headgear instead of the one broken by Gabby. When he returns, he challenges these interlopers, the Cerebravores, by the articles of the Shadow Proclamation. The defiant Cerebravores say that they have already consumed the Fleshkind from their own planet who tried to interfere with their silent hunt, that Earth is now their second hunting grounds and that all flesh beings and all psi-forms are their prey. Then they use worst fears of a group of park workers to take over their bodies and use them as hosts, just like they did earlier with the train guard in the subway. Outnumbered, Gabby and the Doctor run and hide behind the bushes until the monstrous shapes pass. The Doctor deduces that Cerebravores first use a person's fear against the person to get control over the body, and then project fears of others onto this body, simultaneously depleting the host's body of energy due to extreme physical stress. Gabby and Doctor think that the alien Cerebravores can easily push out the native Pranavores and then devastate the whole planet.

While the Doctor ponders how these intruders came to Earth, Gabby provides him with an answer: she witnessed their arrival two nights ago in her father's laundromat. Finally, the Doctor understands how they used the synchronised rotary motion of washing machines as an entry point for their interdimensional bridge enter and to cloak their entrance . The problem is that the bridge is still operational from the other side, and any rotation here on Earth can potentially be used as an entry point.

To prevent a full-scale invasion, the Doctor and Gabby run back to the laundromat through the empty streets. Suddenly, Gabby becomes depressed. Putting the headgear on, the Doctor sees a huge Cerebravore shape behind her. Gabby manages to fight the attack off by holding on to her fears as her own, but a whole mob of Cerebravore hosts arrives, and she and the Doctor have to flee into the laudromat. The Doctor opens the door with his sonic screwdriver, and they manage to pull down the steel security screen locking the monstrous mob outside just in time. The Doctor decides to travel through the portal to close the bridge from the other end and asks Gabby to keep the washing machines spinning long enough for him to return, leaving her the headgear to protect her from further telepathic attacks. In return, remembering her trick in the subway, he takes her mirror with him. On the other side of the bridge he finds only devastation and a lot of Fleshkind, completely consumed by Cerbravores. Whilst Gabby, distracted by a possessed version of her friend Cindy, suddenly remembers that the back door needs to be locked too, a Cerebravore wraps its tongue around the Doctor's arm holding the screwdriver.

Part three

The Cerebravore searches through the Doctor's memories, however he is able to defeat the Cerebravore using his sonic screwdriver, freeing a Fleshkind. She was forced to weaponise the Pranavores, removing their benignity and hive mind and turning them into telepathic hunters - who in turn destroyed her own world.

On Earth, Gabby's family is wondering where she is; she is faced with telepathic projections in the laundromat. Singing, she drops more coins into the washing machine to extend the portal. The Doctor talks with the Fleshkind scientist, who gets possessed by a Cerebravore. The Doctor falls through the portal, narrowly avoiding the Cerebravore. Gabby passes the headset to the Doctor, and they run from the laundromat roof back to the TARDIS. In the TARDIS, Gabby asks the Doctor if he is an alien, which he confirms. She asks him what planet he's from, but he avoids the question. He makes adjustments to the headset to use it as an empathetic field amplifier. Trinity Wells warns New York residents to avoid the Brooklyn area, particularly Sunset Park, with public transport and communications shut-off. The Doctor tells Gabby she needs to keep singing.

Evading Cerebravores, they are able to locate her family celebrating the Day of the Dead ceremony in Green-Wood Cemetery. She introduces the Doctor to her family, but the festivities are soon interrupted by the approaching Cerebravores. Creating an orchestra of song, the Cerebravores are contained within the cemetery and by punching the button on the Empathetic Field Amplifier, it amplifies the song, destroying the laundromat and removing the spirits of the Cerebravores across the city. Gabby is scared to face up to her father, however he is proud of her and tells her to follow her dreams. The Doctor speculates that the Pranavores may have made him kinder. Having accepted a meal with the family, Gabby has worked out that the TARDIS can travel through space and wants to travel with him, seeing him as a better teacher than any college. However, the Doctor is wary as "friends of mine have been hurt" recently and they agree to part ways, telling her to have a "brilliant life" and to "keep singing". However, when she says a saying of her grandmother's, "no song should end too soon", resembling Carmen's prophecy, he agrees to one trip.

Characters

Visions

References

Notes

  • Gabby Gonzalez is the Doctor's first companion of Mexican descent. Given the Hispanic origins of her family, a number of Spanish words are used by them, including:
    • Culo - ass
    • ¿Neta? - Oh, really?
    • Mija - daughter, dear
    • Abuelita - granny
    • Madre de dios - Mother of God
    • Tata - nanny
    • La dia de los meurtos - Day of the Dead (misspelled)
    • Mi albondiguita - my little friend
  • This series takes place in the period between Planet of the Dead and The End of Time.[1]

Original print details

to be added

Continuity

Footnotes

  1. ↑ http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=58226: Andrew James "He's just rejected Christina De Souza as a potential companion -- so what makes Gabriella Gonzalez from Brooklyn any different?"
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