Parahuman

Parahuman (or para-human) was a label attributed to the humanoid members of the Special Executive team during the early days of the Time Lord history. Parahumans showed abilities such as psychic powers, time acceleration or the ability to pass through solid matter. (COMIC: 4-D War, Black Sun Rising) The first parahuman brigades were contemporaneous with the first Looms on Gallifrey. (PROSE: Hark! The Herald Angels Sing)

Behind the scenes

• Lance Parkin's short story Executive Action, originally published the charity anthology Walking in Eternity, explained that the parahumans of the Special Executive were the result of Rassilon's first experiments with Looms, and Rassilon formed the Special Executive to do the Time Lords' "dirty jobs". Later, when Rassilon ordered a purge of the Womb-born (as seen in Cold Fusion), the Special Executive fled Gallifrey and became an independent team.
  • This backstory has been accepted by many Marvel fans and was referenced in the Faction Paradox short story Hark! The Herald Angels Sing, where "the first parahuman brigades" are listed among other elements from Rassilon's early reign. Marvel has also acknowledged the information in their official handbooks, with the entry for the character Saturnyne in Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe A-Z #10 mentioning that she "hired Gallifreyan parahuman interdimensional mercenaries, the Special Executive", and the entry for the Technet (a rival team to the Special Executive which included some of their members) in X-Men: Phoenix Force Handbook explicitly identifying said members as "loom-born Gallifreyans."
• Daniel O'Mahony's A Rag and a Bone, published in the 2003 fanzine Myth Makers Presents: Essentials, mentions "Dawn Brigades of parahumans" fighting "cat people" in Gallifrey's past. The story features a dog-faced parahuman in "Gallifreyan scarlet" as a veteran of Gallifrey's First Time War and an assistant of Sabbath.
• Several beings resembling members of the Special Executive appear in the comic series Top 10.