Tenth Sontaran Battle Fleet
The Tenth Sontaran Battle Fleet — once known as the Tenth Sontaran Battle Brigade and also as the Tenth Sontaran Fleet for brevity — was a Sontaran Battle Fleet encounted by several incarnations of the Doctor.
The fleet, first encounted by the Sixth Doctor in the 1980s, was led by Group Marshal Nathan before his grisly demise, and by the 21st century, the military unit was commanded by General Staal.
History
20th century
On 23 February 1985, (PROSE: Fixing a Hole) Group Marshal Nathan of the Tenth Sontaran Battle Brigade, and his subordinate, managed to get inside the Sixth Doctor's TARDIS with a vitrox bomb, plotting to destroy the timeship after they tapped into the power cable to detonate the explosive device. After the Doctor accidentally transported Tegan Jovanka into the TARDIS, they set about isolating all the TARDIS's power to the control room to lure the Sontarans to them. Tegan accidentally transported Gareth Jenkins to the TARDIS, and the Doctor got Gareth to help lay a trap for the Sontarans.
When the Sontarans arrived in the control room, Nathan immediately recognised Gareth's name to that of the leader of the Earth Defence Force leader who would defeat their invasion of Earth in 2001; Nathan believed they were the same individual, but the Doctor suggested that it was perhaps just a coincidence. They were killed by Gareth when he activated the trap which shot gas at the Sontarans, brutally killing them. Outside, the rest of the fleet was spotted by the TARDIS crew in space, (HOMEVID: A Fix with Sontarans) but the incident was behind them in only a matter of hours. (PROSE: Fixing a Hole)
21st century
The structure and narrative flow of this section could be improved. Sentances could be expanded eyond single clauses, and perhaps more detail can be given.
In 2009, the Tenth Sontaran Battle Fleet was led by General Staal who sent the fleet into Earth orbit in the early 21st century during the Sontaran invasion of Earth. The Sontarans planned to turn Earth into a cloning world. Command of the fleet took place from the flagship, which had many smaller support craft. The invasion failed, however, and the entire battle fleet was destroyed, save one, by the Tenth Doctor and Luke Rattigan.
Luke Rattigan plotted with the Sontarans to assist them with the installation of ATMOS, designed to turn the atmosphere of Earth poisonous. The fleet waited, with the General in the flagship which had a teleport pod link to the Rattigan Academy near London, which Luke had created.
The flagship was destroyed by Rattigan after he sacrificed himself to end the invasion, as the fleet prepared to fire upon the planet. The explosion of the flagship destroyed the smaller craft around it. Because of the intervention of the Tenth Doctor, his companions and UNIT, the ATMOS plan had already failed. (TV: The Sontaran Strategem/The Poison Sky) Though thrown off course by the blast, one Sontaran spacepod and its pilot, Commander Kaagh survived and crash-landed onto Earth. Alone on the planet, Kaagh attempted then to destroy Earth on his own. (TV: The Last Sontaran) Two other spacepods, the ones of Commander Tarx and Commander Lohr, were too close to the flagship and exploded. (PROSE: The Last Sontaran)
Parallel world
In a parallel world, the three members of Torchwood Three, namely Jack Harkness, Ianto Jones and Gwen Cooper, destroyed the fleet. Ianto and Gwen died and the immortal Jack Harkness was teleported to the Sontaran home planet of Sontar. (TV: Turn Left)
Similar references
In an alternate timeline where the Cybermen used Time Lord resources to conquer all of history, when a squad of Sontarans captured the Tenth Doctor, Gabby Gonzalez and Cindy Wu at Cosmomart in the 24th century, Sturg identified himself to the Doctor as a commander of the "Tenth Sontaran -" before being interrupted by the Doctor. Later, the Sontaran-Prime referred to the Doctor as field marshal of the "Last Great Sontaran War Fleet". Whether these names were referring to the Tenth Sontaran Battle Fleet was unknown. (COMIC: Supremacy of the Cybermen)
Behind the scenes
Brigade or Fleet
The fleet's debut isn't as straightforward as one might imagine: in 1985's A Fix with Sontarans, Group Marshal Nathan identified himself to the Sixth Doctor as being part of the Tenth Sontaran Battle Fleet. In 2009's The Sontaran Stratagem, the Tenth Sontaran Battle Fleet was seemingly introduced. However, this group may have been intended to be one and the same with the aforementioned Tenth Sontaran Battle Brigade, for reasons such as the names sounding extremely similar and the fleet being in operation in the same time period — the twenty-ish year span from 1985 to 2009. However, acknowledging these groups as one and the same on this Wiki was a matter of conjecture historically, as the original version of A Fix with Sontarans was deemed as an invalid source — meaning that this Wiki does not treat it as an acceptable source for writing ostensibly in-universe articles — due to its fourth wall breaking ending, as well as the lack of strong in-universe connection to confirm the link. The short story Fixing a Hole was of no use either, as it didn't mention the fleet by name, just an offhand reference to the two Sontarans from A Fix with Sontarans.
It was only in the 2022 recut of A Fix with Sontarans that the story became valid, due to the fourth wall breaking ending being removed and replaced with an all-new scene, that the story became a valid source, thus meaning the the groups could be considered one and the same. Furthermore, the new ending dispelled all doubt that the groups were the same, as the new scene featured the Sixth Doctor explicity identifying the Tenth Sontaran Battle Brigade as a "battle fleet", meaning "brigade" and "fleet" were likely just synonyms in Sontaran lingo.
It should also be noted that the comic story Supremacy of the Cybermen may have alluded to the groups being one and the same in a backhanded method: Sturg identified himself belonging to a group of Sontarans whose named began with "Tenth Sontaran", before being interrupted by the Tenth Doctor. This could easily be an attempt to conflate the groups subtly.
Other information
- The subtitles for the 2022 edition of A Fix with Sontarans stylises the name of the group as the "10th Sontaran Battle Brigade".
- According to NOTVALID: Strax Field Report: The Doctors, the Tenth Sontaran Battle Fleet was crewed by Sontarans from the same clone batch as Strax.
