Battle of Hedgewick's World of Wonders
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The Battle of Hedgewick's World of Wonders was a battle between human forces led by the Eleventh Doctor and Clara Oswald and the Cybermen on Hedgewick's World of Wonders. During the battle, the Cybermen's goal was to escape the planet where they had been left a thousand years before to recover from damage inflicted during the Cyber-Wars while the heavily outnumbered humans attempted to foil their plans. During the battle, the Cybermen held a significant advantage in numbers and also the fact that their Cyber-Planner Mr Clever was trying to take control of the Eleventh Doctor.
The battle eventually ended when the man known to the participants as Porridge was revealed to be Emperor Ludens Nimrod Kendrick Cord Longstaff XLI who had fled to get away from the pressures of being Emperor. Porridge was able to destroy Hedgewick's World and the Cybermen on it with a planet-imploding bomb while transporting the survivors to safety. However, a single Cybermite survived the battle undetected. (TV: Nightmare in Silver)
History
Origins
During the Cyber-Wars, damaged Cybermen were transported to a planet by a Valkyrie for repairs. Eventually, three million weapons-grade Cybermen would be sealed in tombs on this planet. The war ended when the Tiberian Spiral Galaxy was sacrificed to destroy the Cybermen. The survival of three million Cybermen on this particular planet would go unknown for over a thousand years. Following the destruction of the galaxy to stop the Cybermen, a protocol was developed where if a single Cyberman was spotted, the planet on which it resided would be destroyed to prevent it from escaping.
Around a thousand years after the Cyber-Wars, a man named Hedgewick bought the planet on which the damaged Cybermen resided. Hedgewick went on to build Hedgewick's World of Wonders, "the biggest and best" theme park in the galaxy. However, patrons began to be kidnapped in secret by Cyber forces in order to repair the damaged units hidden in the tombs below the surface. As a result, the theme park was abandoned aside from a punishment platoon stationed there, Webley and Emperor Ludens Nimrod Kendrick Cord Longstaff XLI, who went by the name "Porridge", and had run away from the loneliness of his job. (TV: Nightmare in Silver)
After discovering that their nanny Clara Oswald was a time traveller, Angie and Artie Maitland blackmailed Clara and the Doctor into taking them on a trip in the Doctor's TARDIS. (TV: The Crimson Horror) Due to Hedgewick's World's nature as the greatest theme park in the galaxy, the Doctor chose it as the location to take the children to. Upon arrival, they were greeted by Webley and the punishment platoon with the Doctor tricking the latter using his psychic paper.
To the Doctor's surprise, they learned the Hedgewick's World had been shut down but Webley took them to his museum where he revealed a collection including three inert Cybermen, one of whom defeated Artie at chess. The Doctor quickly determined that Porridge was secretly operating the Cybermen and Porridge took the children on the Spacey Zoomer Ride. Before they departed the museum, Angie's interest was drawn by a waxwork of the missing Emperor. Unnoticed by all, they were observed by hidden Cybermites amongst the waxworks. (TV: Nightmare in Silver)
The battle
After the children finished playing on the Spacey Zoomer Ride, the Doctor suddenly decided to stay on Hedgewick's World of Wonders, stating that his attention had been drawn by "funny insects." Angie and Artie were left to sleep in Webley's museum while the Doctor, Porridge and Clara investigated.
At the same time, Webley took stock of his day's progress near the Cyberman he used for chess playing. Suddenly, the Cyberman came to life and pinned Webley's hands to the table. Several Cybermites emerged from the Cyberman and proceeded to upgrade Webley. Growing bored, Angie decided to wander off on her own, leaving Artie alone in the museum. Observing the two and analysing Angie's mobile phone, the Cybermites were ordered to upgrade the children. Shortly after Angie left, a spooked Artie turned on the lights before being abducted by a Cyberman.
As the Doctor investigated the surface of the planet, Porridge explained to Clara about the Cybermen and the history of the Cyber-Wars and the destruction of the Tiberian galaxy. The Doctor noticed Angie sneak into the punishment platoon's barracks and warned Clara. Due to her boredom, Angie decided to bother the soldiers who had begun having problems with their equipment. While initially annoyed by Angie's presence, Captain Alice Ferrin's interest was drawn when Angie mentioned "the little bloke" Porridge. Before Ferrin could question Angie too much on Porridge, they were interrupted by the Doctor and then the arrival of a Cyberman. The platoon tried to attack the Cyberman without much luck which resulted in it dodging their attacks and abducting Angie. Angie was taken to a partially-converted Webley and Artie who was under Cyber control and upgraded herself.
In the aftermath, the Doctor stopped Clara from chasing after Angie and questioned Ferrin about her platoon's lack of fighting efficiency. Ferrin was forced to admit that they were a punishment platoon sent to Hedgewick's World of Wonders to be out of the way and not get into trouble. Annoyed, the Doctor used his claimed power as the Imperial Counsel to place Clara in charge of the platoon. The Doctor ordered Clara to find a defensible position while he went to rescue Angie and Artie and reiterated the order to her to not allow anyone to blow up the planet.
Once the Doctor left, the platoon pulled their anti-Cybermen weaponry out of storage and Ferrin and Clara studied a map of Hedgewick's World for a defensible position. After learning that Natty Longshoe's Comical Castle was a real castle with a drawbridge and moat, Clara decided that it was their best bet for a defensible position. Ferrin warned Clara that while her platoon could deal with a single Cyberman, there were protocols for if they couldn't immediately find and destroy it, protocols that included the destruction of planet. Clara insisted on following the Doctor's plan, backed up by Porridge who confirmed Clara's new position as the platoon's new commander. With no way to contact the Imperium, Ferrin reluctantly agreed to retreat to the more defensible position of the castle.
The Doctor returned to Webley's museum where he found a Cybermite and warned anyone watching that he was coming to rescue the children who were under his protection. The Doctor was able to use his sonic screwdriver to activate a transmat link in the Cybermite that transported him to the Cyber tombs. There he found Angie and Artie both under Cyber control and the partially-converted Webley. To the Doctor's shock, Webley stated that they needed children "but the children stopped coming" until the Doctor brought them Angie and Artie. Webley hailed the Doctor as the "saviour of the Cybermen."
As they made their way to the castle, Clara questioned Ferrin on what the Imperium would do if they knew of the threat. Ferrin insisted that she would be ordered to blow up the planet even with everyone still on it. Though the platoon expressed a desire to chase the Cyberman, Clara insisted on going with the Doctor's plan based on her past experiences with him.
In the Cyber tombs, Webley explained to the Doctor that as the battle waged between the humans and Cybermen, the Cyber-Planners had built a Valkyrie to save critically-damaged Cybermen by bringing them to the planet for repair. The Doctor realised that the people who went missing were "spare parts" for the Cyberman to repair themselves which Webley confirmed, stating that the Cybermen had upgraded themselves to be unbeatable. The Cybermen had needed the children to build a new Cyber-Planner, but with the arrival of the Doctor, this had changed. The Cybermen realised that the Doctor would be perfect as their new Cyber-Planner and had long-since upgraded themselves to be able to use non-humans for their needs.
Webley threw Cybermites onto the Doctor, creating a split personality in the form of a Cyber-Planner that called himself Mr Clever. The Doctor and Mr Clever began battling for control of the Doctor's body, each controlling 49.881% of the Doctor's brain. The remaining .238% is controlled by neither which left them in a stalemate. To help break the stalemate, the Doctor allowed Mr Clever to access information on the Time Lords and regeneration and threatened to regenerate to destroy Mr Clever and everything he was connected to. To break the stalemate, the Doctor proposed a "winner takes all" game of chess between the two. Though if Mr Clever won he would gain access to everything in the Doctor's head, the Doctor demanded that if he won, Mr Clever got out of his head, let the children go and nobody died.
At the same time, Missy spotted the Cyberman while patrolling in the power station. While Missy tried to hide, the Cyberman detected her when Missy breathed too heavily and detached his hand to kill her. At the castle, Brains reported to Clara about losing contact with Missy which caused Clara to realise that the Cyberman was coming. Clara was shown the platoon's weaponry which consisted of one anti-cyber gun, five hand pulses and a planet-imploding bomb. Clara took the trigger unit for the bomb, but was warned by Ferrin that there was a fallback voice activation that would respond to a voice command from Ferrin. Clara and Ferrin argued about not using the bomb to destroy the planet before Porridge requested to keep one of the hand pulses for himself. Ferrin agreed and ordered Porridge upstairs so she could show him how to use it.
In the Cyber tombs, the Doctor and Mr Clever played their game of chess. Mr Clever taunted the Doctor with the fact that there were only a finite number of moves in chess and he could pull in the processors of other Cyber units to help him calculate his moves. Mr Clever also discovered that there was no record of the Doctor in the Cyberiad and realised that the Doctor had been erasing himself from history. The Doctor reminded Mr Clever that earlier versions of the Cybermen had weaknesses to gold and cleaning fluid and the Doctor slapped his golden ticket to the Cyber implants on his face, deactivating them. The Doctor gathered the chess board, Webley, Angie and Artie and departed to reunite with the others.
In the upper levels of the castle, Ferrin revealed that she knew of Porridge's true identity as the Emperor. Ferrin insisted that as a punishment platoon, they could not defeat a Cyberman and the Empire had to be warned. However, with the communicators out, the only way to do so was to destroy the planet. Unnoticed by the two, they were observed by a Cybermite. Porridge attempted to order Ferrin not to destroy the planet as Clara arrived to question the necessity of the extreme action. Porridge explained that after trying other ways, it had been discovered that they only worked sometimes and destroying the entire planet was usually the only sure way to deal with the Cybermen. Determined to end the Cyber threat, Ferrin ignored orders from both Porridge and Clara to desist and attempted to voice activate the bomb. However, guided by the Cybermite, a Cyberman shot Ferrin through a window from outside, killing her and stopping the bomb activation.
Recognizing that the Cyberman would just pick them off one by one if they did nothing, Clara decided that the platoon had to destroy the Cyberman. The platoon searched through the power station where Missy had been killed and one found the Cyberman's head. However, she was ambushed and killed by the Cyberman who had detached his head. The Cyberman took down two more members of the platoon and converted them with Cybermites before being confronted by Ha-Ha. Ha-Ha drew the Cyberman's attention long enough for Clara to destroy it with the anti-cyber gun. When the two converted platoon members rose again, Ha-Ha stopped Clara from using the gun against them as he recognised that there were likely more Cybermen. Instead, two more platoon members took them out with their hand pulses.
After the platoon took out the Cyberman, the Doctor reunited with them outside of the castle. Due to the Doctor's Cyber implants, he was originally seen as a threat, but quickly convinced them to stand down. The Doctor explained how he currently had control of the Cyber-Planner but that he was trapped in the Doctor's head. Clara was shocked to see Angie and Artie's "waking coma" state and the Doctor warned that more Cybermen were on the way and ordered the platoon to get him to a table and tie him down so that he could finish his chess game with Mr Clever.
After being tied down, the Doctor expressed confidence that he would win before removing the golden ticket. Instantly Mr Clever took back control and taunted that the Doctor only had a 25% chance of winning. Mr Clever taunted Clara about the Doctor's interest in her as the Impossible Girl and stated that the Cybermen were waking in their tombs with the intention to turn everyone into spare parts before building a spaceship to leave the planet. As Mr Clever offered the choice of conversion or death, Clara noticed the Doctor's hand writing a message to hit him and did so, restoring the Doctor to control of himself again. The Doctor dodged Clara's questions about why she was the Impossible Girl and admitted that even if he won the game, Mr Clever was likely to go back on his word and kill them all anyway. As Clara expressed concern about the children, Mr Clever took back control and stated that their brains were in standby mode and the children had a better chance of surviving than she did. Mr Clever ordered Clara to go and die pointlessly far from home while he finished his game.
Joining the platoon, Clara warned that there were more Cybermen coming and was informed that the anti-cyber gun had about a dozen shots left in it. Clara realised that there were likely more than a dozen Cybermen coming. Clara spotted a power cable and came up with the idea to electrify the moat to fry the Cybermen as they attacked since the Cybermen couldn't fly. The platoon acted on Clara's plan by dropping the electrified cable into the moat and raising the castle drawbridge.
As daylight arrived and the game continued, the Doctor sensed something and Mr Clever revealed that the Cybermen were all waking up. The three million Cybermen emerged from their tombs on the planet and began to march towards the castle. As the platoon waited for the coming attack, what was apparently the Doctor called out to Clara and she went to see what he wanted. The Doctor asked about their weapon situation and Clara explained how they had five hand pulses, one anti-cyber gun and one planet-imploding bomb. The Doctor asked for the remote detonator, but Clara stopped short of giving it to him as she realised that it could be Mr Clever instead of the Doctor. Clara challenged the Doctor to tell her something only she would know, but realised that she was dealing with Mr Clever when he started flirting with her.
Clara was able to restore the Doctor to control with another slap, but Mr Clever managed to take control of the Doctor's left arm only. Mr Clever used this control to take the detonator from Clara and smash it against the table, rendering the bomb inoperable. The Doctor realised that Mr Clever had gotten what he wanted by destroying the detonator and Mr Clever took over to announce the arrival of the Cybermen. As Clara and the platoon realised how dire their situation was with their limited weaponry, Mr Clever stated that he'd learned a lot from the Doctor but it was now time for "the end game".
As the first Cyberman entered the moat, it was disabled by the electricity. However, all of the Cybermen quickly upgraded themselves to get rid of the weakness and began crossing the moat to the castle. Hopelessly outnumbered, Clara gave the gun to Ha-Ha, their best shot and ordered him to shoot anything that made it across while the other platoon members took up defensive positions and Porridge kept himself safe. As the Cybermen broke through the gate, Ha-Ha began destroying them with the gun while Porridge retrieved the bomb and commented that Ferrin should've destroyed the planet when she had the chance.
As the battle raged and the Cybermen got closer, Mr Clever offered the Doctor a choice: the Doctor could take Mr Clever's bishop and "keep limping on for a little longer" or the Doctor could sacrifice his queen and get the children back. However, Mr Clever warned that he would have checkmate in five moves and would get the Doctor's mind. As the platoon struggled to hold their position, taking casualties, the Doctor chose to sacrifice his queen despite Mr Clever taunting him that it was a bad move and cost him the game. Regardless, Mr Clever released Angie and Artie from Cyber control.
With the platoon falling one by one under the Cyber attack, Mr Clever decided to have Webley kill Angie and Artie as a further distraction for the Doctor. However, before Webley could attack, Porridge entered the room with the bomb and witnessed Mr Clever's order. Though kicked aside by Webley and knocked unconscious, Porridge managed to use his hand pulse on Webley, shorting out Webley's implants and killing him.
The anti-cyber gun lost efficiency as the Cybermen upgraded to become immune to it. With the platoon nearly overrun, the Doctor warned Mr Clever that sacrificing his queen was the best possible move he could've made as the Time Lords had invented chess and the Doctor could now win in just three moves unless Mr Clever was careful. Mr Clever continually demanded to know how, but the Doctor refused to answer and challenged Mr Clever to figure it out for himself. Finally, in order to do so, Mr Clever pulled in the processing power of all three million Cybermen, rendering them immobile as the Cybermen were about to upgrade Clara, Ha-Ha and Brains, the only surviving fighters.
Now overconfident, Mr Clever claimed that the Doctor could not possibly defeat him with three million Cyber brains working on the chess problem. However, the Doctor still insisted that he could and retrieved Porridge's hand pulse before explaining his moves: Move One: turn on sonic screwdriver, Move Two: activate pulse, Move Three: amplify pulse. With the hand pulse's power amplified, the Doctor struggled with Mr Clever in order to use the device on himself. Finally, the Doctor managed to apply the hand pulse to his implants, destroying them and freeing the Doctor of the Cyber influence as the survivors entered the room.
After convincing Clara of his identity, the Doctor warned that he had only redistributed the Cyber-Planner across all three million Cybermen and it would now wake them all up, kill them and start constructing a spaceship. With no other choice, the Doctor realised that they had to destroy the planet before the Cybermen could get off it. The Doctor discovered with the sonic screwdriver that even with the detonator destroyed, the bomb had a fallback voice activation. However, with Ferrin dead, there appeared to be no one capable of activating the bomb. To everyone's shock, Angie suggested that they ask Porridge, having realised that he was actually Emperor Ludens Nimrod Kendrick Cord Longstaff XLI and would thus likely know the code to activate the bomb. Porridge admitted his identity but also that he didn't want to be Emperor and felt that if he activated the bomb, it would all be over. The Doctor reminded Porridge of the three million Cybermen that needed to be stopped and how that was worth dying for.
As the Cybermen began to advance again, Porridge agreed to activate the Desolator with his power as Emperor. As the bomb activated, Porridge stated that they had about eighty seconds until it blew which was more than enough time for the Imperial Flagship to locate them from Porridge activating the bomb, warp-jump into orbit and transmat everyone to the State Room. Moments later, the Doctor, Clara, Porridge, Angie, Artie, Brains and Ha-Ha were transmatted aboard the Imperial Flagship in orbit. At the Doctor's request, Porridge had the Doctor's TARDIS transmatted aboard as well.
With about ten seconds left on the bomb, the Cybermen reached it, but were unable to do anything to stop it. As the survivors of the battle watched from aboard the Imperial Flagship, Hedgewick's World of Wonders was destroyed by the Desolator, taking with it the three million Cybermen. (TV: Nightmare in Silver)
Aftermath
With the planet and the Cybermen destroyed, Clara kindly rejected a marriage proposal by Porridge and was returned home by the Doctor alongside Angie and Artie.
Once the Doctor, Clara and the children had departed, Porridge had the Imperial Flagship scan the debris field for signs of any surviving Cybertech. Finding none, it was believed that all of the Cybermen and their technology had been destroyed when the Desolator detonated. The Imperial Flagship departed the remains of Hedgewick's World of Wonders for home, not realising that a single Cybermite had survived in space. (TV: Nightmare in Silver)
