Battle of Canary Wharf
The Battle of Canary Wharf, also known as the Fall of Canary Wharf (AUDIO: Broken) or the Battle of Torchwood, (TV: Fear Her) was a major conflict in Earth's history. It involved four distinct primary forces — Daleks led by Dalek Sec, Cybermen from Pete's World, Torchwood One under the leadership of Yvonne Hartman, and the small band of individuals loyal to the Tenth Doctor and Pete Tyler. Each contingent had different goals, and none were actually complete allies.
It was finally ended when the Doctor sealed all of the Cybermen and Daleks in the void at the cost of being permanently separated from Rose Tyler, who became trapped on Pete's World. It also ended the war against the Cybermen on Pete's world as well. (TV: Doomsday)
However, the presence of the cracks in time led to the public invasions from 2006 to 2009 being erased from N-Space Earth's history, meaning no-one remembered the Cybermen or the Daleks. (TV: The Pandorica Opens) The Eleventh Doctor eventually closed the cracks, allowing for the restoration of things lost to them, (TV: The Big Bang) though various people still were unfamiliar with aliens. (TV: The Woman Who Fell to Earth)
Goals
The objectives of the battle were different for its various combatants:
- For Torchwood One, it was essentially a war for fuel. Mistaking a mysterious source of energy in the air above Canary Wharf as something they could harness, Torchwood One was trying to find a renewable source of energy to fuel a new independent "British Empire" and never depend on outside sources of energy ever again. What they didn't understand was that their greed enabled the arrival of the Daleks and the Cybermen, and created the situation by which the walls between the dimensions of reality could eventually break down. Like all of the groups in the conflict, they had no allies in the conflict. The Daleks were just as willing to kill Torchwood members as the Cybermen were to convert them. Torchwood One was also bound by their charter to oppose the Doctor, on principle alone after the incident at Torchwood House in 1879.
- For the group of Daleks that had escaped the Time War by fleeing into the Void with a Genesis Ark of Time Lord construction, it was mostly an attempt to return to the normal universe and restore the Dalek race, however, this was hindered by the Daleks having to battle the Cybermen for the planet, though the Cybermen were hardly an obstacle, as well as the presence of their old enemy, the Doctor.
- For the Cybermen, who had mostly been contained on the parallel Earth the Doctor called "Pete's World", it was mostly an attempt at survival. The Preachers had begun systematically hunting down the remnants and Cyber-converted victims of John Lumic's initial Cybermen forces that plagued the parallel world. By situating themselves on a new Earth, they hoped they could again prosper. Their attempts at forming an alliance with the Daleks immediately failed and they found themselves unexpectedly fighting against the Daleks, Torchwood, and the Doctor.
- For the Doctor and Pete, the battle was primarily about closing the breaches created between the dimensions, so as to protect the fundamental integrity of reality and shut down Torchwood One's interference with it, but it later expanded to include the defence of Earth against both Dalek and Cybermen invasions.
History
Origins
The Battle of Canary Wharf had its roots in the Last Great Time War. Determined to ensure the Daleks’ survival, the Cult of Skaro fled into the Void in a Void ship, bringing with them the Genesis Ark, a Time Lord prison ship containing millions of Daleks. Their escape created a crack in the universe which permitted travel between dimensions more easily than should have been the case after the demise of the Time Lords. (TV: Doomsday) The Doctor's TARDIS fell through the crack and arrived on a parallel Earth, where the Tenth Doctor, Rose and Mickey became embroiled in the rise of Cybus Industries’ Cybermen. (TV: Rise of the Cybermen) They helped the Preachers shutdown the factory in London, killing the Cyber-Controller, however factories across the world were still operating. Mickey stayed behind to help the Preachers in their war against the Cybermen, with the Doctor and Rose returning to their universe and closing the crack behind them. (TV: The Age of Steel) After a war across the world, the Preachers succeeded in confining the surviving Cybermen to their factories. (GAME: Cyber Assault)
When the Void ship returned to the universe, it created a breach above London. The Torchwood Institute identified the breach as a radar black spot and built the Torchwood Tower to reach it, eventually discovering they could produce energy using it. Unknown to them, in doing so they were widening the breach and colliding their universe with that of the parallel Earth. They also kept the Void Ship in the Tower, spending years fruitlessly studying it. (TV: Army of Ghosts) On the parallel Earth, a parallel Torchwood conducted similar experiments, causing global warming to accelerate on their world. The Cybermen infiltrated Torchwood and used their technology to cross over to the other universe. (TV: Doomsday)
Beginnings
The Parallel Earth Cybermen began to manifest across Earth when Torchwood experimented with the breach, being assumed to be ghosts of deceased humans. This led to one of the more bizarre episodes in human history, as these "ghosts" came to become integrated into human society during “ghost shifts”, to the point of even being featured in pop culture venues such as TV chat shows and soap operas. (TV: Army of Ghosts)
After two months (three years in Parallel Earth time), the Cybermen suddenly appeared in their true form, occupying every landmass on the planet, breaking into houses and promising to upgrade all humans, commanded by the new Cyber-Leader. (TV: Army of Ghosts/Doomsday, TV: Everything Changes) In response, the humans began a resistance campaign. While hampered by Cybermen armour being "bulletproof", heavier weapons, such as rocket launchers, were effective against them. (TV: Doomsday)
Simultaneously, the Cult of Skaro had exited the Void Ship with the Genesis Ark. The Cult, led by Dalek Sec, extracted information from Torchwood One's Rajesh Singh and proceeded to communicate with the Cybermen via Dalek Thay. After a short round of commands and insults from both ends, Daleks and Cybermen identified their adversaries (the Cybermen through a faux pas on the Dalek Thay's part and the Daleks through records of their universe's Cybermen), prompting more insults. The Cybermen proposed an alliance between the two races, as their technologies were compatible and together the two could "upgrade the universe". Thay rejected the proposal. Once their proposal was denied, the Cybermen attacked Thay, who was unharmed, and he retaliated, killing both Cybermen. The Cyber-Leader promptly opened a visual link to the sphere chamber and declared war on the Daleks. This led to the Daleks to declare war (or in Dalek Sec's words, "pest control") on the Cybermen in turn. In the background, one of the cult spotted the Doctor who had wandered onto the screen, and Rose revealed his identity, visibly frightening the Daleks. (TV: Doomsday)
The battle
Following contact with the Daleks, the Cybermen began to convert Torchwood personnel, including Yvonne Hartman and Lisa Hallett into Cybermen in order to counter the Daleks' threat. (TV: Doomsday, Cyberwoman) These were, at least in some cases, not full conversions with the brain removed and put in a Cyber-shell, but partial conversions in which the Cybermen were built over the human body beneath. (TV: Cyberwoman) These incomplete conversions were likely done in an effort to create an army to quickly fight the other belligerents in the battle that had already begun.
Torchwood was invaded by the Preachers from Pete's World, who rescued the Doctor, destroying the initial Cyber-Leader One in the process with a Cyber Unit being immediately upgraded into a replacement Cyber-Leader. After learning more about the invasion from Pete Tyler, the Doctor "surrendered" to the Cybermen.
The Cybermen established a reluctant alliance with the human forces and some armed themselves with newly modified energy rifles. The Tenth Doctor entered the sphere chamber to learn about the Daleks' intentions and distract them. Using his sonic screwdriver, he triggered the doors to blast open.
The Cybermen-human alliance rushed into the Sphere Chamber and the humans 'rescued' the Doctor and his companions. The Daleks began to panic as the Cybermen were overcoming them. However, shortly thereafter the Cult of Skaro developed an immunity to the parallel Earth energy weapons and their firepower was restored. All the humans survived this skirmish, but this was mainly because the Daleks identified the Cybermen as the greater threat and concentrated their fire on them. It was during this skirmish that the Genesis Ark was accidentally primed by Mickey Smith. The Daleks declared victory and began moving the Ark.
The Cult travelled to the main room in Torchwood Tower, barging through a door and shouting "exterminate!". Most of the Cybermen were waiting for them, along with armed Torchwood personnel and at least two Preachers. A huge, though one-sided, battle ensued, with the Cybermen opting to use their long-range weaponry instead of their traditional electrified gauntlets. With heavy Cyberman casualties following the clash, the Cyber Leader called for all troops in the greater London area to report to Torchwood Tower.
Dalek Sec elevated above the roof and opened the Genesis Ark, releasing millions of Daleks. These flew over the city in droves and were spotted by the Cyberman forces summoned by the Cyber Leader, who opened fire on them from below. Dalek Sec retaliated by ordering the extermination of all life-forms below, regardless of whether they were humans or Cybermen. In the streets, terrified humans ran for cover as the battle raged above and around them, though many were exterminated by stray Dalek blasts. (TV: Doomsday)
As the battle raged, Ianto Jones searched for Lisa Hallet and encountered Kieran Frost, head of Torchwood One’s security, who had been partially-Cyber converted. Kieran gave him Object 1, which he had been ordered to throw into the Void by Yvonne. (AUDIO: The Torchwood Archive)
The Tenth Doctor, his companions and the Preachers opened the Void while the Cybermen and the Daleks rushed to stop them. A converted Yvonne Hartman halted the Cybermen attack. The device sucked all the Daleks and Cybermen who had been in the Void back into it, nearly sucking Rose herself in, but Pete Tyler teleported through the Void, grabbed her and teleported back to his parallel Earth. It was here that Rose, Jackie, Pete and Mickey had to stay, as the Doctor had only opened the breach from the one side, and once it had sealed itself, it could not be reopened.
The battle had lasted less than a day, but the Doctor commented on the aftermath that "so many" people had died that day and that the effects on Earth had been devastating. Rose and Jackie were listed among the dead. (TV: Doomsday)
Aftermath
Torchwood One was annihilated, resulting in the destruction of the "old regime". There were subsequently only half a dozen remaining Torchwood staff. (TV: The Sound of Drums)
Members of Torchwood Three, including Jack Harkness, salvaged all the alien technology from the ruins of Canary Wharf. (TV: Fragments) Torchwood Three became the main base of all Torchwood operations. (TV: Everything Changes) Jack cleaned up the aftermath (AUDIO: Poker Face) and read the battle's list of the dead, finding the name of Rose Tyler. However, he was later made aware that she had survived and was living in a parallel universe. (TV: Utopia)
Known Torchwood survivors included Lisa Hallett and Ianto Jones, although Hallett's survival, partially converted into a Cyberman, was not immediately known to anyone save Jones. (TV: Cyberwoman) Jones (presumably hiding Hallett) subsequently travelled to Cardiff where he eventually ingratiated himself into Jack Harkness' Torchwood Three. (TV: Fragments) Jones hid Hallett in a secret area of the Torchwood 3 Hub for months, hoping to reverse her conversion, but was unsuccessful. She was finally terminated, making her the last known victim of the battle. (TV: Cyberwoman)
The events of this invasion were recounted in Daleks - Invasion Earth, by Christian Peterson. (PROSE: The Secret Lives of Monsters)
Long after the battle, Michael Hamilton continued to see Cybermen outside his mother's house. (TV: Greeks Bearing Gifts)
The governments of the Earth denied the battle had ever happened and blamed the reports on mass hallucination caused by terrorists polluting the water supply with psychotropic drugs. (TV: Everything Changes) It appeared life on Earth returned to normal. London would endure several more major high-profile incidents involving aliens in the coming months and years (TV: The Runaway Bride, Voyage of the Damned, Partners in Crime, The Sontaran Stratagem/The Poison Sky, The Stolen Earth/Journey's End, Children of Earth); by the end of the first decade of the 21st century, the existence of alien life had become common knowledge to a large percentage of the populace, although there were many who refused to accept this reality. (TV: The Last Sontaran, Children of Earth: Day One)
A group of eight Cybermen who were converted humans from Earth were not pulled into the Void as a result of them having never been there worked to reopen the Void and release their army, something the Doctor stated was impossible even for him. Even using teleportation equipment stolen from Torchwood and electronics equipment stolen from a store and government labs, the Cybermen were unable to reopen the Void so they worked to capture the Doctor who had been drawn to their activities while visiting Earth with his new companion Martha Jones. The Cybermen kidnapped Martha to force the Doctor to help and attacked a military base in an attempt to capture him, but the military destroyed five of the six attacking Cybermen, forcing the last to retreat after telling the Doctor to help them or lose Martha. The Doctor tricked the Cybermen into believing he was opening the Void but really opened a space-time portal to the Jurassic period where a Tyrannosaurus Rex came through the portal and destroyed two of the surviving Cybermen before returning to its time. The Doctor then used a power cable to destroy the Cyber-Leader and left the deactivated equipment to the arriving military. (PROSE: Made of Steel)
By 2012, the Battle of Canary Wharf had become known as the Battle of Torchwood, a publicly known event cited in news broadcasts. (TV: Fear Her)
Remembrance of the Battle of Canary Wharf was implied when a new army of Cybermen appeared on Earth several years later; a news report noted that the newly-arrived metal men were known as a Cybermen but now had the ability to fly "unlike the accounts [they had] on file". (TV: Death in Heaven) In February 2021, “GH” commented on Into The Unknown suggesting the Battle as an example of the Mandela Effect, as his friends were unable to recall the incident unlike him and dismissed his claims about it as whimsy. (PROSE: The Mandela Effect, Or Monsters on the Streets of London)
By the 2050s, Daleks and Cybermen had become common knowledge. (TV: The Mad Woman in the Attic)
As a result of the Reality Bomb, some Cybermen who had been sent into the Void escaped into Victorian London where the Doctor battled them with the help of Jackson Lake who was deluded into believing he was the Doctor himself. The Doctor destroyed the Cybermen, sending their remains along with their Cyber-King into the Time Vortex to harmlessly disintegrate. (TV: The Next Doctor) However, others apparently escaped the Void at the same time. (TV: The Pandorica Opens) though any that remained in the Void along with the surviving Daleks were destroyed as a result of the reality bomb. (TV: Journey's End)
In 43K2.1, the Beast told Rose, who had yet to experience the Battle of Canary Wharf at that point, that she would "die in battle so very soon", which the Tenth Doctor insisted was a lie. (TV: The Satan Pit) As it turned out, though Rose survived the Battle of Canary Wharf, she was officially declared dead on her Earth. (TV: Doomsday)
Facing the Cybermen on a Mondasian colony ship, the Twelfth Doctor recalled defeating them in Canary Wharf among other places. (TV: The Doctor Falls)
Behind the scenes
- The online video game Daleks v Cybermen allows gamers to attempt an alternate version of the Battle of Canary Wharf. In this game, the player controls the Cybermen, who are locked in combat against Torchwood, the Preachers and Daleks. The player wins by killing Dalek Sec.
- "Battle reports" — for lack of a better term — were given in Battles in Time. This wiki treats these descriptions with some suspicion, since Battles in Time is, save for its comic strip, a non-narrative source. Nevertheless, the following summarises the things claimed about the actual battle by the editorial staff of DWBIT:
- Battlefronts included Tower Bridge and the Tower of London, along with the town of Southwark. Although the Daleks only had a presence for several minutes, they reached as far as Aberdeen, where a group of Cybermen decided to change their tactics and ambush the Daleks. A single Cyberman was used as bait; when a group of Daleks arrived, the Cybermen attacked. However, this advantage was short-lived as more Daleks turned the tables. While they were vastly superior to the Cybermen, the Daleks did suffer some casualties, mostly due to Cyberman ambushes. There were some sightings of Daleks friendly fire. One Dalek was caught in an explosion caused when another Dalek blaster blew up a car. (DWBIT 17, Daleks vs Cybermen Special, Dalek Wars)
- Battles in Time also claimed that, after the battle concluded, a single Cyberman ended up deep in the oceans of Philjax III, in the year 9000 during the Daleks' battle with the Squeeth. (DWBIT 9)
