#and their enslavement of TARDISes

[theangelshavethephonebox]

Sutekh's Sexy Adventure

I am truly, truly sorry for this. Doesn't mean I regret it. It's about Sutekh seducing the TARDIS - slightly spoilery for the legend of ruby sunday, sorry!

[theskyexists]

I actually really like how Gallifrey and the Time Lords (here also a standin for Doctor Who lore) are talked about on the TARDIS wiki. It places contrasting and outright mutually exclusive information right next to each other, painting a colourful, overlapping, multi-dimensional patchwork. 'By some accounts'. This actually is, I think, the best and perhaps only approach to an universe in which time-travelling is 'relatively' common (and in which canon is very long, variably 'canon', and plays fast and loose with it all). Gallifrey becomes a looped, paradoxed and ruled up eldritch monster that lumbers through time-space trying to sew its flesh back on as it sloughs off continuously. Memories of the people who were 'there' are just as questionable as of people who had nothing to do with it. Not only that, but history is revealed as the corrigible and manipulable records that are societies' educational programs, databases and tribal stories, people's heads full of things that might have happened, never happened, happened in 29 different ways. The Time Lords become myths even to themselves despite having a sense for it and of course, a touch for it. It's a function not just of their near-immortality but also of them being time travellers. It makes Time Lords strangers to themselves, only reinforced by the process of regeneration. The more you run rings around timelines, the more tangled by them you become and the more parts of you become weighted, shadowed and uncertain. The only reason that Gallifrey hasn't yet swallowed itself right up might indeed be due to Rassilon's 'observe don't meddle'/neutrality Laws or perhaps rather because the Gallifreyans are so extremely naturally gifted at feeling it out (and indeed the Time War came close to catastrophically shatter-excising their existence from reality). Is that natural gift something Rassilon engineered or was it an evolutionary coincidence, was it a cultural coincidence, was it the Academy, was it a paradox? Who knows. The idea that an ancient and powerful species that can literally go back in time to check their own history would be wrapped in ambiguity is great and just fits. Even better is this being in contrast with (in reference to this post) Gallifrey being absolutely obsessed with their own Great Mythical and Legendary status - attempting singularity in history in response to this very phenomenon (the reason why they call themselves 'Time Lords') - being allegedly the creators of it and trying to control it as to not be subject to it in detrimental ways. The Doctor has been many people from the start of History - and they can't remember it all - often times literally, but they do keep trying to run from the whole mess (which so awfully attempts and pretends to be a streamlined Imperial paradise of Power, Order and Removedness) - and just can't manage it.

[rowanthestrange]

Azure stresses me, but Swarm intrigues me on a deep meta level.

Yes, I know I keep harping on about it, but to me that name is so evocative of the plagues of Ozymandius and Moses. And following that poetry where it leads, that Swarm is also a sign, an effect from God, where perhaps God is Time. That the Time Lords have the Flux but Time has Swarm. The planet Time being a desert, with a Temple. The Master not-brother-in-chief invoking Ozymandius directly, the Doctor like Moses, a child cast adrift to land in another world, among the Lords but also destined to upend them if they refuse to listen. “Let my people go.” Which people? Not the Lords, never the Lords. The idea that the Crystal beings are even metaphorically linked to TARDISes, when the opposite of wild time must be enslaved time. But is she doing her job if the name Timeless Child means Godless? Or Godless because that’s the race that will be created from her? How do you stop the plagues, the Swarm? By listening to God, Time. The rules that it gives you, never of anyone else’s design or creation. The Swarm destroys, the Swarm consumes, but it is not a random evil from nowhere. It is a consequence. And it was not inevitable. Thirteen’s theme that is incongruous and easily forgotten of Faith. Here we have a Doctor who has prayed, to whom faith has meaning. Clawing her way back from the pain of losing her people in two ways. The Jewish-coded aliens of The Ghost Monument - an episode named for a TARDIS, the themes of empire, repeated cycles, Nazis, with the Master making it brutally clear what a Time Lord can be without their robes, because he is teaching her, through stories.

[jossujb]

I think my single favorite expanded universe Doctor Who thing is that TARDISes are like just a species of somewhat humanoid, and definitely intelligent aliens that were contemporaries to Gallifreyans, and they just happen have the property opening up intoa dimensions.

And proto-Time Lords just saw this as so useful that they enslaved and kinda I dunno “domesticated” this useful trait to be used as vessels.  And they like, breed them, “type 40″ kinda sorta meands just how many generations in their forceful breeding the Doctor’s TARDIS.

It’s my favorite expanded tidbit, cos it’s like, not entirely necessary to have on the TV show proper, it’s really dark. And not always canon, DW doesn’t have canon. But what it does, it provided whole new context to just about every episode you ever watch, cos like. TARDIS is actually a person, who is objectified to a point that she’s unable to take shape that would read as a person. She’s unable to communicate directly with most people and their agency is stripped down. Even if she left the Doctor, as she do sometimes fuck off or leave them where ever, like what is she gonna do without them? She’s bred into this object - I dunno, reverse breed her descendant back into people?

That’s just deeply fucked up, and I like it.

[grassangel]

I think it's actually canon-compliant! But: your puddle AU?

For those who don’t know, this is an AU/interpretation of canon that imagines that puddle of ‘oil’ from an alien ship is actually what happens when you leave a Time War TARDIS unattended for 70 years, which is what I headcanoned when I answered a question about where Missy keeps her TARDIS on a Master meme on twitter

So, and this is all preamble: Humanoid TARDISes are a thing.Idris had The TARDIS consciousness placed inside her and there’s the whole holographic interface. Plus, when I saw this ask made to @evilqueenofgallifrey (which definitely influenced this headcanon/AU), I sort of went down the lore rabbit hole and found out that the TARDIS can appear in/have a humanoid form and that a companion had been changed into one. (There’s apparently more lore that the Master’s former TARDIS, a twin to the Doctor’s, was very fond of appearing humanoid and basically staged a coup on Gallifrey? but I didn’t find that out until after this headcanon had started to seed in my head)

These humanoid type TARDISes were involved in The War/War in Heaven, not The Time War, but if the Daleks can have puppets with eyestalks in their foreheads, the Time Lords can have their genetically modified, bred and enslaved humanoid TARDISes. Obviously being used in a war doesn’t necessarily make them a War TARDIS but-In the Doctor Falls, Simm!Master confirms he took a TARDIS, one heavily implied to be a War TARDIS. Not all TARDISes used in the war are these humanoid TARDISes but TARDISes are sentient enough to communicate with one another, perhaps enough to give each other ideas…

So Missy has a War TARDIS. It’s probably well kitted out, plenty of defences, definitely has a working chameleon circuit, and certainly isn’t a type 40. We never see her TARDIS though, as apparently she parks well away from whatever scheme she has going on and instead uses a Vortex manipulator to travel short distances.

We don’t know where it was parked when she was arrested. But the Doctor can be sensible at times, so I’m willing to bet that she told him where it was and he towed it or she gave him her Stattenheim remote control to recall it, so that it wouldn’t be nicked like the Thirteenth Doctor was so concerned her TARDIS might be.

So it sits somewhere in Bristol for 70 years, disguised, because the chameleon circuit works. (That or Missy parked it there to begin with, as she does love keeping track of what the Doctor is up to.)The chameleon circuit means it’s perfectly hidden and gently persuades people to move on and ignore it. So if it was parked in an empty lot just after WWII… that lot might just stay empty.

But 70 years in the same place could make a TARDIS antsy. It knows the Doctor’s TARDIS stole someone. It wants to fly again, so it starts looking for a pilot. It’s a War TARDIS, so it has a bit more initiative and can bond with a new pilot more easily than a model that isn’t expected to regularly have its pilots dying or fade in and out of existence.

It finds Heather. Or Heather finds it.Either way, they both want the same thing. So it changes her. Okay, it got things a bit wrong and enmeshed itself a bit too closely into her biology, but it’s not used to working with humans.

So Missy’s TARDIS is now Heather. Or Heather is now Missy’s TARDIS. Or perhaps they’re both a little bit of each other.They can still see the universe together though, so they do. (At least after clearing up the thing with Bill they do.) And doesn’t the whole seeing the universe together echo the promise the Doctor and the Master made so long ago?Heather of course returns for Bill. And the TARDIS is happy to adopt (and manipulate the biology of) another pilot.

Being a TARDIS herself, of course Heather can pilot the Doctor’s. Probably even lets her know how she can be contacted just in case she and the Doctor needs some help. (And even outside of this AU, Heather and Bill occasionally hijack the TARDIS, much like River does, and take her for a spin because the TARDIS likes Heather, Heather likes Bill and Bill likes the TARDIS. It’s a bit of a weird threesome and Bill never wants to discuss it with either the Doctor or the kind of hot cougar lady they sometimes bump into. Especially cougar lady, as the TARDIS gives off a little chime in her presence that feels like she’s saying ‘daughter’ and just. No.)

But because she’s also Missy’s TARDIS, she went to collect Missy too. Her TARDIS couldn’t forget its mistress.Though like… she just puts Missy in a safe place before continuing on with Bill, leaving Missy to kind of… hitchhike her way across the universe for a bit.

(Not necessarily a hard and fast part of this headcanon/AU, but Missy does track down Bill and Heather during their travels at some point and apologises for the whole cyber-conversion disaster and offers a ‘completely safe and non-deadly’ adventure as to make up for it. It’s meant to be just one. It turns into seven and at least three of those are decidedly not safe or non-deadly.)

Depending on how much I’m taking the novelisation of TUaT as canon in a given moment, Heather either joins up with Missy again after Bill dies or they both kind of… tag along as combo TARDIS/companions after bumping into Missy again. (There is more hand holding than Bill is entirely comfortable with.)

I think that was five? Probably more, given I feel like this is basically not!fic/something that would otherwise be called an outline, but the following are the hard and fast things

Missy’s TARDIS was in Bristol.

The TARDIS chameleon circuit meant it was invisible and deterred people from where it was parked.

It was the puddle in that empty lot

It adopted/changed Heather to become its new pilot, both of them combining/merging to become something similar to Compassion, the first and only, humanoid type 102 TARDIS

Being a TARDIS herself now, of course Heather knew how to pilot the Doctor’s TARDIS

Missy’s TARDIS is at least a little faithful to her mistress and does save her from the colony ship

Missy’s TARDIS/Heather does return to Missy at some point

(Definitely not a part of this headcanon/AU, but the Doctor’s TARDIS definitely got Ideas after the run-in with Pilot!Heather and convinced Missy to give her a few upgrades that would give her some of the features of the humanoid type TARDISes.)

[madfantheyinablueblog]

TARDISes are really interesting in DWEU lore. Some random tidbits:

- In the VNAs, there are plenty of scenes where the companions will just suddenly be in an abstract void. This tends to happen whenever the Doctor's TARDIS is losing focus/dying/exploding or something. So at some level, the TARDIS is always consciously creating and keeping form of its interior for all of her passengers. Without her focus, they're simply lost in an eldritch void.

- Also in the VNAs: The TARDIS is incredibly connected to the Doctor psychically. At one point, the Doctor is doing "spring cleaning" on his own mind and this accidentally projects through the TARDIS and the wave hits Ace, who has temporary amnesia.

- TARDISes are very much alive, and used to be a completely free and wild species vrowmping throughout the cosmos. However, they were enslaved by Timelords.

- More advanced versions of TARDISes could not only speak with their passengers, but their outer shells could literally be people. In the EDA Alien Bodies, there's a TARDIS and her Timelord who are companions to each other. The TARDIS looked like a woman who walked around, talked, etc. When "opening her doors," that basically just meant space would distort around her and a sort of portal would appear where she was allowing entry to the interior.

- Later on in the EDAs, one of the Doctor's companion actually BECOMES a TARDIS. While the Doctor and Fitz (another companion) are inside, they would sometimes feel her emotions.

Anyways on a more positive note, have some TARDIS fluff! I wrote this passage a while back for a fan-project. This is a fan-made companion in Thirteen's TARDIS:

The TARDIS door creaked open kindly as Jacob entered, the warm yellow glow providing comfort and the ship’s hum welcoming him home after a long day. He swore, sometimes it felt like the TARDIS was in some way, alive. There would be some sleepless nights where he would wander the corridors, and suddenly he’d find a kitchen where there hadn’t been one previously. Inside, the lights would be warm and comforting and there would be a kettle on the table with freshly brewed tea and a mug next to it. The tea would always be his favourite kind as well.

TARDIS headcanon: TARDISes generally only interact with other psychic species (gallifreyans and other TARDISes) on a regular basis and so don’t make a lot of noises beyond the general background hum, naturally favoring telepathic communication

The reason our TARDIS’s sounds get so much more complex as the show goes on (from mostly just a hum in the early classic series to a whole menagerie of beeps, chirps, hums, warbles, etc.)? She’s been in the company of humans for so long that she’s learned to compensate for their lack of telepathy by picking up their habit of vocalizing all the time

[rowanthestrange]

If I was writing this (and potentially I am somehow), I would be really tempted by one out-there idea, in regards to the whole ‘Ravagers’ are protoTARDISes theory. Not a ‘this will happen’, just a temptation.

We have the Timeless Child, baby Doctor sent through a portal from somewhere, (possibly the previous universe) who ends up being medically experimented on in order to produce the Time Lord ‘race’. Non-zero chance she’s Bel and Vinder’s child maybe exposed to vortex ala River (which I probably wouldn’t do, but is a valid option).

Azure is complicated. Because her name means ‘Blue’, but she’s got a scarily intense sadist vibe, has no evident moment or fascination with the Doctor, is clearly important cus she exists when the story in no way needs her but taken a minimal role so far, and for whatever reason that Swarm and Azure get the Division punishments rather than killing them (I assume the Doctor’s decision), Azure gets a wipe and to live a life, if a somewhat restricted one, despite the atrocities.

She could end up as the TARDIS and I’d find no inconsistencies, yet feel like you wouldn’t want quite that kind of sadism vibe, and surely you’d write both Swarm and Azure as heavy flirting with the Doctor. (Honestly the biggest hole in that theory for me tbh)

Out-there temptation: What if the Time Lords didn’t enslave Azure. They enslave her ‘daughter’. Maybe just a chunk of crystal. Who ends up being experimented on in order to produce the TARDISes. Just like the Doctor was. All the consequences of the story, but avoiding the sadism issue and of knowing exactly who’s ‘in there’ now. And ‘Blue’ still makes sense cus that’s who she is deep in her structure.

And if the Timeless Child is indeed designed to be sent through like a predestination paradox to ensure Time Lord supremacy (where every time the universe is destroyed with a dead man’s handle when they’re wiped out, it is reborn with her sent through, and the universe will ultimately create the exact circumstances to produce her all over again to send through next time), then maybe the TARDIS is supposed to do the same. With or without a Passenger.

Which would mean that in whatever universe, the Doctor and TARDIS would always be together.

[theskyexists]

The Doctor let a soldier 'of hers' mass murder all the TARDISES of Gallifrey, and she's just made one of the last two survivors kill itself in the void.

This sure is a perfect opening for the TARDISES to come knocking about them being sentient and enslaved and now genocided and how that's actually not super cool.

[rowanthestrange]

The McCrystalSkulls are all the alive, Space-Time teleporting, psychic linking, and finger clicking bits of the TARDISes complete with fade in and out as showcased so nicely in that last ep going into/from her mind i think (nice touch)

The Passenger Forms are the bigger-on-the-inside and endlessly generating mechanics of a TARDIS - in people shape cus TARDISes are alive but aren’t treated like such, like the Passenger Forms which are visually represented with a dehumanising leather slave thing going on, visual commentary etc.

The inside alive bits and the outside techy bits, currently separate.

Logic to me suggests in that timeline, at that point, no-one had succeeded in jamming these two together yet to make a full TARDIS - something that can be controlled from within - but since we’re going with the McCrystalSkulls wanting heavy revenge for an unexplained enslavement by the Division/Time Lords, and they reference not wanting to hurt the TARDIS, clearly they know in at least some timeline in some way people do or did manage to squash them together.

That’s my short-form essay on them anyway. Whether that ends up being useful now or is just to be picked up be extended universe stuff later is up to chibs.

passenger forms arent related to tardises right

[madfantheyinablueblog]

The TARDISes, after being enslaved and forced to breed in captivity for aeons the second they hear the Timelords finally meeting karma:

It is absolutely fucking hilarious that Gallifrey was burning, the Time Lord corpses were literally stacked to the ceiling, and then all the TARDISes were perfectly fine, dandy, ready for use, minding their own business.