Interference (novel): Difference between revisions

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|first story      = Interference - Book One{{!}}Shock Tactic

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{{you may|Doctor Who and Interference|n1=the novel as it exists within the DWU}}

'''''Interference''''' was a two-part [[Doctor Who]] story written by [[Lawrence Miles]] and published by [[BBC Books]]. It featured the [[Eighth Doctor]], [[Fitz Kreiner]], and [[Sam Jones]] alongside the [[Third Doctor]] and [[Sarah Jane Smith]]. Its two volumes, subtitled [[Interference - Book One|Book One (''Shock Tactic'')]] and [[Interference - Book Two|Book Two (''The Hour of the Geek'')]], were both released on [[2 August (releases)|2 August]] [[1999 (releases)|1999]].

As a [[multi-Doctor story]], ''Interference''{{'}}s two volumes comprised the output of both [[BBC Books]]' [[BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures|Eighth Doctor Adventures]] and [[BBC Past Doctor Adventures|Past Doctor Adventures]] lines for [[August (releases)|August]] [[1999 (releases)|1999]]. Since then, the two books have usually been counted as the 25th and 26th Eighth Doctor Adventures. {{as of|2019}}, ''Interference'' is the only two-part novel ever published as part of a Doctor Who range.

The novel featured one of the only prose-based [[regeneration]]s of [[the Doctor]]. It was the final story for [[companion]] [[Sam Jones]] and the first for [[Compassion]], whose character arc lasted until ''[[The Shadows of Avalon (novel)|The Shadows of Avalon]]'' in [[7 February (releases)|February]] [[2000 (releases)|2000]].

''Interference'' built on the concepts of [[Faction Paradox]] and the [[War in Heaven]], both of which were introduced in author [[Lawrence Miles]]' previous Eighth Doctor Adventures novel ''[[Alien Bodies (novel)|Alien Bodies]]''. It introduced several elements, such as the [[Eleven-Day Empire]] and the [[Remote]], which later played important roles in the ''[[Faction Paradox (series)|Faction Paradox]]'' series.

In Part Two, he Faction warship arrives at a planet a few light-years from Dust. It had been colonized by humanity and infiltrated by the Faction before Earth fell and the colony was abandoned. To prevent the Time Lords from noticing the Faction's other activities during their inevitable investigation of Dust, the warship destroys every settlement on the planet.

Outside the wagon, the Remote invasion of the town is underway. Though Remote armour has changed in appearance since the 20th century, most of the Remote are still mostly human underneath. The only exception is the oldest member, who is so old and frayed that his armour is the only thing keeping him together: his flesh has grown into the cracks of the plating, and his receiver's wiring has fused into his spinal column. The receiver has been mostly dormant for centuries, but when it activates – for instance, upon detecting a nearby Time Lord - it fills him with adrenaline. He thinks back to his earliest memories: his first meeting with the Doctor; his first trip on the TARDIS; his first encounter with the Faction; and more importantly, his failure to commit suicide on Anathema, his decision to join Mother Mathara while a copy of his biodata stayed behind in the Remembrance Tanks, his rise to the rank of Father in the Eleven-Day Empire, after which he was put in charge of one of the last Remote communities. [[Father Kreiner]] promises his soldiers that with the technology in Foreman's wagons, they will leave the planet that night.

Magdelana is hiding between two of the wagons, doing her best to avoid being noticed by the Remote soldiers. With her shotgun she briefly aims at the Remote leader before he moves out of the way; then she focuses on the Doctor, who has stepped out of I.M. Foreman's wagon and is strolling toward the soldiers. Magdelana has the overwhelming urge to pull the trigger, but she was distracted by [[Mohandas the Geek]], who at that moment stepped out of his wagon next to her.

Although the Doctor's plan is to introduce himself with a simple hello, Father Kreiner's receiver floods his body with adrenaline and he punches the Doctor in the face. Sarah listens as Kreiner apologises and the two start a conversation. When the Doctor comments that this visit to Dust is "wrong", Kreiner bitterly alludes to how the Doctor abandoned him and left him to wait for two thousand years, though rather than explaining it all, he would rather just kill him, even though he is a younger incarnation than the one he knew. The Doctor threatens to leave with the Traveling Show, but Kreiner reveals that the Remote are using their biosphere technology to lock it in place. High above them all, the Faction Paradox warship arrives in orbit to watch the events.

Frantic, Sarah consults I.M. Foreman, but he shushes her: through meditation, he is coordinating a plan with the other performers in the show (except for unstable Number Thirteen). The Doctor approaches his wagon with the Father's ultimatum, that they surrender the Traveling Show and the Doctor's life in exchange for the lives of the townsfolk; at the same time, he is distracted and disturbed by the revelation that the two crucified aliens were [[Ogron Lord]]s, as the idea of the Time Lords using Ogron slaves is inconceivable to him. Despite not having a plan, I.M. Foreman proposes a solution.

Ten minutes later, the Doctor, Sarah, and I.M. Foreman exit the wagon as all the other freak show members (save Number Thirteen) emerge from theirs. In a long line they process to the town square, where Father Kreiner is waiting with the Remote and the hostage townspeople. I.M. Foreman dramatically reveals that the other members of his Traveling Show are actually his twelve future incarnations, all of whom he found in the wastelands of Gallifrey shortly after the Time Lords abolished the priesthood. Therefore, if Kreiner kills them all on Dust, it will create a formidable [[paradox]].

The Doctor and Sarah run away before Number Thirteen engulfed the square, and Father Kreiner tries to follow them but pauses at the screams of his Remote soldiers. A single tendril lashes out and catches his arm by accident; the armour pumps sedatives into his body to dull the pain, but his arm and its armour look shrink-wrapped, tiny, and weak, as if the monster sucked his biodata from the limb.

Meanwhile, the Doctor flies the TARDIS over the square to where I.M. Foreman and his other eleven non-final incarnations are surrounded by Number Thirteen, who is leaving them for last. The Doctor quickly links the TARDIS to the Traveling Show, which adopts the TARDIS's form and function and rescues the incarnations of Foreman. Father Kreiner, believing this second TARDIS to be the Eighth Doctor's, uses the last of the armour's power to cut through Number Thirteen and latch onto the TARDIS as it enters the Vortex, but he is roughly half a second too late. As the Traveling Show is unburdened by the restrictions usually placed on TARDISes, the Doctor sends it to [[Gallifrey]]'s ancient past, where it explodes, leaving its passengers to [[regeneration|regenerate]] together in a fashion so traumatic that their memories are all lost. Hours later, the original I.M. Foreman wanders over a nearby crag and goes to help them.

As a final errand, the Doctor returns the TARDIS to Dust and confronts Number Thirteen, reminding it about I.M. Foreman's goals and the Remote biosphere-manipulation machinery it now contains. At the Doctor's suggestion, it merges with Dust, flowing into every plant and animal on the planet.

As the Doctor walks back to the TARDIS, he is confronted by Magdelana Bishop and her shotgun. He confirms her logic that where one [[time travel]]ler visits, others tend to appear, and such an event happened on Dust that day; he then reassures her that the Remote and I.M. Foreman have been "buried" and that he is on his way to leave. Magdelana stops him, however, and reiterates her duty to protect the town: she can't take the chance of more time travellers arriving, so she needs to make sure every trace of the Doctor is gone and buried. With that, she shoots him in the chest and leaves him in the street to die.

Mother Mathara watches from the Faction warship in orbit. Cousin Llewis ruminates that they have failed their mission of infecting I.M. Foreman with a [[biodata virus]] during regeneration so Foreman's World could become a new Faction homeworld. Instead, the virus latched onto the Third Doctor, beginning a process in his biodata that would, by his eighth incarnation, convert him to the Faction's perspective. An early symptom of this will be the disappearance of his shadow (which occurred for the Eighth Doctor in ''[[Unnatural History (novel)|Unnatural History]]''), though Mathara notes that the Faction can fit him with a fake one.

At the start of Book Two, I.M. Foreman and the Doctor wake up from where they slept on the hillside. After the two watch the clouds together for a while, the Doctor presents a theory that the TARDIS was behaving so erratically during Sam's last few adventures because it wanted to prepare for what was about to happen. He then finishes telling Foreman what happened on Earth, concluding by reiterating his suspicions that something had changed, and that it was somehow connected to him, the Remote, and his time spent in the prison.

Foreman presents the Doctor a riddle about a goose in a bottle, then finishes her story about what happened on Dust. The Doctor ruminates on the identity of the Remote's leader, saying he seems familiar in hindsight and that he feels as if the answer is obvious but his mind doesn't want him to work it out. This has been bothering him since his adventure on Earth, and he asks Foreman if, since she swallowed up the leader, she has access to the memories. She recognises this as his true motive for the visit. However, she reveals to the Doctor that she did not consume the leader: he had actually been sucked into the [[Time Vortex]], and while she was making her bottle universe, she trapped him inside ''its'' Time Vortex.

|1 || [[Interference - Book One|Book One (''Shock Tactic'')]] || rowspan=2|[[Lawrence Miles]] || rowspan=2|[[2 August (releases)|2 August]] [[1999 (releases)|1999]]

|2 || [[Interference - Book Two (novel)|Book Two (''The Hour of the Geek'')]]