Chris Cwej
Christopher Rodonanté Cwej was a 30th century Adjudicator who travelled for a time with the Seventh Doctor. After they parted ways, Chris was recruited by the Time Lords, and received many enhancements, including the ability to regenerate. (PROSE: Dead Romance) During the War in Heaven, they used his biodata to create the Cwejen, a servant race of duplicates, and the original Chris was designated Cwej-One. (PROSE: The Book of the War) After the War, he underwent an experimental procedure to become a disembodied artificial intelligence, now called Cwej-V and capable of commandeering the bodies of other Cwejen. (PROSE: A Bright White Crack)
Biography
Early life
Chris was born on 5 September (PROSE: The Room With No Doors) 2954. (PROSE: Head Games) His surname should have technically been pronounced "Shvey", but he pronounced it "Kwedge" rather than keep correcting people. His parents, Volsted Kornbluth Cwej and Mrs Cwej, lived in the lower levels of the Overcity and had a long association with the Guild of Adjudicators.
As a teenager Cwej had a reptilian pet. (PROSE: Original Sin)
Chris became interested in law enforcement, not because of any desire to take command, but because of an interest in customised vehicles, powerful weaponry, and women. (PROSE: The Book of the War) He graduated in 2975 from adjudicator training along with twenty-five other studentson Ponten IV. His parents attended his graduation. (PROSE: Original Sin, Lungbarrow)
During a tour of duty, Chris visited the planet Jallafillia. Those who ran the planet, the Church of Saint Thoth, killed children just because they had red hair. Chris witnessed this, but was unable to arrest them because of a clause in the Colonies Cultural Identities Act. (PROSE: Christmas on a Rational Planet)
Chris regarded his first partner, Roz Forrester, as a legendary adjudicator. They were working on a murder case in Undercity when they met the Seventh Doctor and Bernice Summerfield, and they helped the Doctor defeat Tobias Vaughn. (PROSE: Original Sin)
Travelling with the Doctor
With Benny
Missing info from Sky Pirates!, Zamper, Toy Soldiers, Head Games, The Also People, Shakedown, Just War, Warchild, Sleepy, Death and Diplomacy, Happy Endings
Chris and Roz travelled with the Seventh Doctor and Bernice Summerfield on many adventures. In this eventful period, Chris fathered two daughters: Jasmine Surprise Cwej-Hutchings with Ishtar Hutchings, (PROSE: Happy Endings) and iKrissi with Dep of the People. (PROSE: The Also People)
Chris spent some time pretending to be a monk. (PROSE: Warchild)
Chris was present at Bernice Summerfield and Jason Kane's wedding. (PROSE: Happy Endings)
Investigating psychic threats
Missing info from GodEngine, Christmas on a Rational Planet, Return of the Living Dad, The Death of Art, So Vile a Sin
After Chris accidentally deleted part of the Doctor's TARDIS, he unleashed the the Carnival Queen. He found himself trapped in a desert, perpetually manifesting gynoids. Faced with the choice between the Time Lords' order and structure and the Carnival Queen's chaos and uncertainty, Chris was influenced by a false memory of his childhood, implanted in him by the TARDIS, to choose order and preserve reality as he had always known it. The Carnival Queen, knowing what Cwej's future held, knew he had made the wrong decision. (PROSE: Christmas on a Rational Planet)
Chris spent a month living under the alias "Bruce Jovanka" on a cold human colony ruled by the Scientifica while the Doctor and Roz infiltrated the planet's criminal underground. At the Imperial Hotel, Chris encountered Nyssa and Tegan Jovanka. Working with Nyssa, Chris discovered a load of fusion bombs on the Skybase orbiting the planet; the two of them met up with the Fifth Doctor and travelled to the crash site of the Machine. After the Fifth and Seventh Doctors worked together to defeat the Ferutu, Chris left the planet with the Seventh Doctor and Roz. (PROSE: Cold Fusion, AUDIO: Cold Fusion)
When the TARDIS was arrested on Thrantas, Roz and Chris partnered with two local police officers to collect evidence in the case against the TARDIS. He was then arrested for interfering with evidence. (AUDIO: The Trial of a Time Machine)
Chris went with the Doctor to the Quadrant in London in 1987 for a narcotics investigation. When he looked at Gabriel Tyler, he saw a reflection of himself. The Doctor told him to get some cocaine for the investigation, and went on the local pub scene to find it with David Daniels. When the N-Form was activated, the Doctor told Chris to get close to it and stop it with one of his gadgets. (PROSE: Damaged Goods)
Recovering from loss
Missing info from Bad Therapy, Eternity Weeps, The Room With No Doors
After Roz's death in battle, Chris continued to travel with the Doctor for a short time. (PROSE: Bad Therapy)
The Doctor and Chris travelled to the Doctor's home planet, where the Doctor faced members of his House and many dark secrets were revealed. After this, Chris decided to leave the Doctor and travel alone using a Time Ring given to him by Romana II. (PROSE: Lungbarrow)
Embodied work for Gallifrey
Early missions
After leaving the Doctor, Chris became an agent for the Time Lords. (PROSE: Dead Romance) He evidently had some contact with the Eighth Doctor, on account of Cwej's bedroom at Smithwood Manor having a T-shirt that said "My Friend Went to San Francisco and All He Got Me Was This Lousy T-Shirt". Early in the Eighth Doctor's life, the Doctor told Bernice Summerfield that Chris was on Gallifrey. (PROSE: The Dying Days)
After Summerfield destroyed the Spire, she worried that without its effects of "locking the future into reality" the future she knew would never occur, meaning that she had "signed the death sentence for Chris and the others, for a future of skycities and Empire". However, this situation was managed by David Foreman and Clarence, and Bernice was informed that the future history of Chris still existed. (PROSE: Ghost Devices)
Chris was found unconscious on one of humanities' outer colony planets in 2593 by a Knights of Jeneve post-battle clean-up expedition. He was frozen in cryogenic suspension and placed on a planet in the Ardethe system. His memories were affected by the cryogenic process, but he was able to recall most of them in time. He had a small symbol tattooed on his back. (PROSE: Deadfall)
Subsequently, Cwej travelled with Bernice Summerfield to defeat Deed and the Godhead (PROSE: Oblivion) and to take down the Project on Megerra in 2594. (PROSE: Mean Streets)
Cwej continued to be an operative of the Time Lords (PROSE: Dead Romance) as they entered their War in Heaven. (PROSE: The Book of the War) His biochemistry was altered by the Time Lords, giving him the ability to travel in time. The Time Lords also altered Chris' memories of his time with the Seventh Doctor, making him remember the Doctor as the "evil renegade" who abducted him from Earth and killed Roz Forrester. (PROSE: Dead Romance)
Regeneration & All-High Gods
Chris worked for the Time Lords in securing the bottle universe which contained a version of 1970 Earth. There, he became friends with Christine Summerfield and showed her the real universe outside the bottle. During this time, he also negotiated alliances with the Daleks on Skaro, the People in the Worldsphere, and the Sphinxes on Simia KK98.
Cwej was exposed to fatal levels of radiation in the final stage of the Great Houses' invasion of the bottle universe. (PROSE: Dead Romance) His masters were initially fine with leaving him to die, but after Irving Braxiatel requested that they send Chris to help with an investigation on Paracletes, a Great Houses monk helped Cwej regenerate into a new body. Though Cwej had injested substances that would turn himself into a "hideous pan-dimensional war machine", the monk disabled the effects (PROSE: Tears of the Oracle) so that his new body would be better-equipped to serve the Great Houses in Remote-occupied areas. House Military strategists remotely shaped his new body to be resistant to the Fat. (PROSE: The Book of the War)
Cwej's first mission in his new body was to go to Paracletes in 2596 to recover data from Edward Watkinson's expedition to the planet. (PROSE: Tears of the Oracle) He continued performing "cultural sterilisations" of Remote colonies for the Homeworld, but in response to his new physical form, he had become profoundly sulky, if not actually mutinous. Some members of House Mirraflex advocated his termination, but instead it was deemed acceptable for Cwej to enroll in the Gauntlet for training.
While in the Gauntlet in the 29th year of the War in Heaven, Cwej was unwittingly used by the Great Houses for their Army of One project. (PROSE: The Book of the War) and the Cwejen were created from Chris' timeline. (PROSE: The Book of the War, AUDIO: The Adventure of the Diogenes Damsel) Cwej was considered for leadership of the Cwejen army, but during his time in the Gauntlet, he exhibited significant socialisation problems, at one point having a duel with another cadet that left him with significant facial scars. As a result, he was considered unfit for command. (PROSE: The Book of the War)
Cwej returned to 2596 to help his friends defeat an All-High God which merged with Absolam Sleed; (PROSE: Return to the Fractured Planet) he then travelled by himself in another star system. However, he was called back to Dellah to fight the Ferutu, and he travelled with Clarence on the way back. In the encounter with the Ferutu, Chris was reverted down his personal timeline to age thirteen, regaining his original body. (PROSE: Twilight of the Gods) The Book of the War described this as "his own sense of self-worth overriding his sense of duty", as he had not yet finished the mission against the Fat for which his previous body had been designed. (PROSE: The Book of the War)
Later activity
Along with returning him to his original form, the encounter with the Ferutu also removed the blocks the Time Lords had placed on Chris' memory, and he said he didn't trust them anymore and wouldn't want to risk dealing with them further. (PROSE: Twilight of the Gods) He remained in the service of the Great Houses, but he became a "loner by nature", nothing like the brash, over-eager agent he had been when he joined.
Cwej's only notable mission in the fourth and fifth decades of the War was his takedown of Faction Hollywood in 1999 Los Angeles. Using his experience with the Cwejen, he manipulated the House of the Seven Gables into betraying information about Michael Brookhaven by framing the oldest member for the Black Dahlia murders. Using the information he learned from another member, he invaded the set of Brookhaven's film Mujun: The Ghost Kingdom during the Hollywood Bowl shooting, initiating a cinematic Samurai duel with Brookhaven. Despite Cwej's advantage, he was left completely at Brookhaven's mercy before they were interrupted by the Gods of the Ainu. After trying to save Brookhaven, Cwej fled. (PROSE: The Book of the War)
Chris was present at the birth of Benny's son, Peter, who "looked rather older than the kid [she'd] last seen," but Benny knew that the unexpected was to be expected with Chris. (PROSE: The Glass Prison)
As Cwej-V
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Changed into a disembodied entity and designated "Cwej-V", Chris continued to work for his Superiors. During an excursion to the parallel universe Dawn 1,027, he encountered Larles and Kwol, a pair of alien criminals from the planet Grigori who had destroyed their version of Earth. Taking pity on them, Chris compelled them to rescue the survivors, then smuggled the two aliens and their spaceship, La Kraw el Sol, back to his own universe. (PROSE: A Bright White Crack)
When damage from a war between the Hytherians and Geldex over the Psychosphere began affecting the dreams of 21st century Earth, Chris' mind was uploaded to the Psychosphere to find a way to shut it down. While there, he met Jen Ashfield and Sara Willox, who both remembered their encounters with Cwej as nightmares. (PROSE: Collective Unconscious)
Other realities
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Other versions of Cwej existed in different histories. (PROSE: So Vile a Sin, Oblivion)
Legacy
While researching the history of the Forrester family for his book, Tranlis Difarallio read that Chris Cwej and Roz Forrester were declared traitors to the Earth Empire after their disappearance. (PROSE: Dependence Day)
When Bernice Summerfield first encountered the Cwej Septimus, she mistook him to be Chris. Seeing this, Straxus was amused that Bernice was familiar with the Cwejen's progenitor. (AUDIO: The Adventure of the Diogenes Damsel)
When Alexander Christian broke into Smithwood Manor in 1997, he hid in Chris Cwej's empty bedroom. (PROSE: The Dying Days)
When the Eighth Doctor was interrogated by a Klade operative, the interrogator expected him to remember an instance on Falkus when the Doctor was accompanied by "a tall man and a dark-skinned woman". As the Doctor did not, this event was either in his pre-amnesic past with Cwej and Forrester or in his future with Fitz Kreiner and Anji Kapoor. (PROSE: Father Time)
Appearance
As an adult, Chris was tall, blond, and muscular. (PROSE: Original Sin) He gave an air of being Canadian. (PROSE: The Book of the War)
When he first met the Seventh Doctor and Bernice Summerfield, he had undergone a "body bepple" to make him look like a bear with golden fur and pointed triangular ears. Bernice thought he looked like a teddy bear. (PROSE: Original Sin)
After his regeneration, he was shorter than his original body and quite stocky, with dark hair and a mellow voice; (PROSE: Tears of the Oracle) an acquaintance of Cwej described it as "Friar Tuck without the haircut." (PROSE: The Book of the War)
Personality
Cwej was enthusiastic and, although he was intelligent, he usually acted before thinking things through. While travelling with Roz, she usually did the thinking for him. (PROSE: Shakedown)
Behind the scenes
- The book which depicts Chris's sexual encounter with a gay man, Damaged Goods, was written by future executive producer of the series, Russell T Davies, whose works often include gay themes. Much like Jack Harkness, an LGBT companion introduced to the TV series in Steven Moffat's The Empty Child, Cwej opines that sexuality is not an issue where he comes from. This same-sex encounter was released just before the debut of Izzy Sinclair, the oft-cited first LGBT companion, in October 1996. In the same year, Jason Kane would casually introduce himself as someone who has slept with 9 women, 5 men, and various humanoid aliens. (PROSE: Death and Diplomacy)
- The covers for the Big Finish Productions audio adaptations Damaged Goods, Original Sin, and Cold Fusion all use voice actor Travis Oliver to represent Cwej on their covers. While it could be said that Oliver resembles Cwej in many aspects, his dark hair conflicts with descriptions of Cwej's blonde hair in the books.
- Cwej's initial appearance, modified by a body bepple to look something like a teddy bear, was intended as a reference to Chewbacca.[1]
Footnotes
External links
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