TARDIS Travels No.36

TARDIS Travels comes right up to date with Series 9 and the 2015 Christmas Special. Last time, the Doctor and Clara left London at Christmas, 2014. Who knows how many unseen journeys there have been, but when we next catch up with the Doctor he is all alone...

Journey 786: Location and date unknown to Skaro, date unknown.
The TARDIS returns to Skaro, and once again the Doctor is not alerted to this fact. The Thal - Kaled war is in progress, and the Doctor comes across a frightened boy in the middle of a mine-field. On learning that this is the young Davros, the Doctor abandons him. How could the Doctor not know that he was on Skaro? Some sort of enemy-homeworld-alarm is surely called for.

Journey 787: Skaro, date unknown, to Karn, date unknown.
Feeling guilty, and that his end might be nigh, the Doctor goes to Karn and passes his Confession Dial to Ohila, leader of the Sisterhood. She is to give it to Missy.

Journey 788: Karn, date unknown, to Essex, England, 1138.
The Doctor takes himself off to medieval England to meditate. He stays in a castle for a month or so and becomes very friendly with the natives. A man named Bors becomes his squire, after he saves him from choking on a marble. Clara and Missy arrive - but so too does Colony Sarff, who has come to fetch the Doctor to meet Davros.

We don't see how the Daleks transport the TARDIS to Skaro. Some form of teleportation it would seem. The Daleks have a weapon that appears to destroy the ship. However, the HADS is in operation. The "D" now stands for Dispersal, rather than Displacement or Defence. The Doctor uses his sonic shades to reconstitute the ship.

Journey 789: Skaro - Dalek city to environs.
The Doctor takes the ship to the desert outside the city and he and Clara watch it being destroyed.

Journey 790: Skaro - date unknown to several centuries earlier.
The Doctor goes back to the mine-field, and this time he rescues young Davros. No sign of Clara. He may have taken her home first, unseen, otherwise she might be waiting in the ship.

Journey 791: Skaro, date unknown, to Caithness, Scotland, 2119.
The TARDIS arrives in the underwater mining complex known as the Drum, which lies at the bottom of a drowned valley. The Doctor notices that something is wrong with the ship - the presence of temporal anomalies as it will transpire.

Journey 792: Caithness, Scotland, 2119, to same, 1980.
The Doctor goes back to the point when the alien spaceship first arrived. The flood has not yet happened, and in the valley is an army training camp, designed like a Soviet township. With the Doctor are Drum crew members Bennett and O'Donnell. The latter is killed by the Fisher King.

Journey 793: Caithness, 1980 to same, half an hour earlier.
The Doctor attempts to return to 2119, but the ship won't allow this. This is because it is caught up in the Doctor's own time-stream. Instead, it goes thirty minutes into the past. The Doctor and Bennett must avoid their earlier selves - and cannot save O'Donnell.

Journey 794: Caithness, Scotland, 1980, to same, 2119.
Bennett is alone in the ship when the emergency hologram takes it back to the Drum. The Doctor is already there - having been in hibernation for 159 years - the reason why the ship didn't like landing here in the first place.

Journey 795: Caithness, Scotland, to unknown region of space, date unknown.
Unseen, the Doctor has led some belligerent aliens on a wild goose chase across the cosmos in order to drain their engines and weapons. Clara has been left hanging in space in the middle of a mine-field, with a parasitic Love Sprite in her spacesuit. The Doctor materialises the TARDIS around her.

Journey 796: Unknown region of space, date unknown, to Scandinavia, 9th Century.
The ship arrives somewhere in Scandinavia. Somewhere with fjords. And Vikings. Fairly rubbish Vikings.

Journey 797: Scandinavia, 9th Century, to London, 2015.
After saving Ashildr, by making her immortal, the Doctor takes Clara back home.

Journey 798: London, 2015, to Hounslow, Middlesex, England, 1651.
The Doctor traces an alien artefact to the countryside just west of London, where he meets Ashildr again. She's now Lady Me, and lives a double life as a Highwayman.

Journey 799: Hounslow, 1651, to London, 2015.
The Doctor goes to see Clara. She shows him a photo of one of her pupils, and he spots Ashildr loitering in the background. (Unseen, the Doctor has at some point taken the pupil to visit Winston Churchill).
The Doctor claims to have kept an eye on Ashildr / Me over the years when we next see her on screen, so lots of unseen journeys which appear to have been made without Clara being present - as Clara looks like she's seeing her for the first time since the Mire business in the Trap Street later on. Clara mentions then that the Doctor has a whole room in the ship catalogueing what she gets up to, which Clara isn't supposed to know about.

Journey 800: London 2015 to same.
The TARDIS travels to Brockwell Park, South London, arriving beside a children's play park. En route, the Doctor has received a warning from Osgood that the truce between the Zygon refugees and the humans might be about to break down - referring to the events seen in The Day of the Doctor. Lots of globe-trotting in this two-parter, but all by conventional transport. The ship is still in the park at the conclusion.

Journey 801: London, 2015, to the Le Verrier space station, 38th Century.
This station is in orbit around the planet Neptune. Not everything that happens here is necessarily true.

Journey 802: Le Verrier space station, 38th Century, to the second most beautiful garden in the universe, date unknown.
We don't get to see it, but the Doctor has almost married a sentient plant form, which almost ate Clara. An amorous Krynoid perhaps? Or maybe Meglos wasn't the last of the Zolfa-Thurans after all...

Journey 803: Second most yadda-yadda..., to London, 2015.
The TARDIS returns to London after Clara gets a call from Rigsy. It materialises in the living room of his flat.

Journey 804: London, 2015 to same.
In order to track down some town plans and maps, the Doctor moves the ship to the city centre.

Journey 805: London, 2015 - street level to mid-air.
With Clara hanging out of the open door scanning the streets below, the Doctor hovers the TARDIS over the city. This is so she can scan for the alien Trap Street.

Journey 806: London, 2015 - mid-air back to street level.
The Doctor takes the ship to the district where the Trap Street is situated. After Clara's death, and the Doctor's disappearance, Rigsy graffiti paints the exterior in her memory, with a portrait and flowers.

Journey 807: London, 2015, to Nevada, USA, 2015.
Presumably Clara and Ashildr bring the TARDIS here using their own TARDIS, which gets stuck in the shape of a diner. It's the same diner that the Eleventh Doctor visited with Amy, River and Rory - near Lake Silencio. Does it just look like it, or was that actually Clara's TARDIS back then? The real diner is in Cardiff Bay. I've breakfasted there a few times. Or have I actually been in Clara's TARDIS...?
On dematerialising, the graffiti peels off.

Journey 808: Nevada, USA, 2015, to Mendorax Dellora, Christmas 5343.
An Earth colony. The TARDIS tries to cheer the Doctor up by giving him holographic antlers. He is not amused, and is threatening to criticise carol singers. He does not notice, or at least comment upon the fact, that the street where the ship has landed looks suspiciously like a Trap Street in central London. (You'd think he would, considering what happened there...).

Journey 809: Mendorax Dellora, 5343, to starliner Harmony and Redemption, date unknown.
Not necessarily still 5343. The vessel is heading towards the Andromeda galaxy. The Doctor gets to do the "it's bigger on the inside!" bit - very badly. At first the ship won't budge, as King Hydroflax is both inside and outside the ship at the same time. The head's inside, and the robotic body is outside. River reveals that she has stolen the ship on many occasions - always returning it to the same place so the Doctor didn't notice. She has installed a drinks cabinet behind one of the lower level roundels, which he never knew about. One of the buttons which the Doctor always presses on dematerialisation actually vents the waste on Deck 7. The Doctor obviously hasn't been on Deck 7 for a very long time, and doesn't plan on going there anytime soon.

Journey 810: Starliner Harmony and Redemption - hold to bridge, date unknown.
Christmas Day, so of course the Doctor is on a spaceship that is about to crash onto a planet. Where else would he be? He's emergency teleported River back to the TARDIS and she materialises the ship around him. In this instance, the spaceship and its occupants (guests and crew) ain't worth saving.
The ship crashes onto the surface of the planet - Derrilium. The impact is felt within the ship.

The Doctor recovers before River and notes that it is night outside, and the wreckage is still blazing.

Journey 811: Derillium, date unknown to same - next morning.
The Doctor nudges the TARDIS forward a few hours. At least that's what it seems. We will find out shortly that a night on this planet lasts 24 years, so it may be more than a few hours, though the wreckage is still being dealt with. Knowing that a restaurant will be situated here overlooking the twin singing towers, the Doctor causes it to be.

Journey 812: Derillium, date unknown to same - a few years later.
The Doctor nudges the TARDIS further forward in time, without changing the geographical location. The restaurant is now built. Trouble is they don't have a booking until Christmas Day in four year's time.

Journey 813: Derillium, date unknown to same - four years later.
The Doctor nudges the ship forward by the four years, so that he and River can finally have that dinner that he kept postponing. She thinks it is her last night, but she's really got up to 24 more years to go. I'm sure that he will have a word with her about nicking his ship, and will make use of that drinks cabinet himself...

So there you have it. A whole year to wait until I can do TARDIS Travels No.38. A bit TARDIS-lite Series 9 was. Before the Flood had a bit but it hardly featured otherwise until you got to The Husbands of River Song, when it was used magnificently.

TARDIS Travels No.35(b)

The second half of Peter Capaldi's first season, plus his first Christmas Special. Last time, the Doctor had taken Courtney into space in order to dump the Skovox Blitzer. Unseen, he will have returned her to Coal Hill.

Journey 764: Location and date unknown, to London, 2014.
The TARDIS returns to Coal Hill School in Shoreditch, where Clara has a problem. The Doctor has upset Courtney Woods, and he needs to do something to help her low self-esteem.

Journey 765: London, 2014, to space shuttle in Moon orbit, 2049.
The TARDIS is supposed to be landing on the Moon itself, but materialises instead on a shuttle which is about to land on the satellite. Later, the Doctor will send Courtney back to the ship. It falls down a crevasse which opens as the "Moonchild" starts to hatch.

Journey 766: Space shuttle to Moonbase, 2049.
The Doctor instructs Courtney in putting a control disc into the console, and the ship travels automatically to the base.

Journey 767: Moonbase to Moonbase, 2049.
Leaving the humans to resolve the problem with the hatching creature, the Doctor departs - returning some time later.

Journey 768: Moon to Earth, 2049.
The Doctor takes Clara, Courtney and Lundvik back to Earth where they witness the hatching - and the creation of a new Moon. The specific location is unknown, but is somewhere in the Americas, as the Doctor implies that Lundvik can walk to Cape Canaveral. All previous trips to the Moon now have to be redefined as Old Moon or New Moon. Or Old Egg and New Egg.

Journey 769: Earth, 2049, to London, 2014.
The Doctor takes Clara and Courtney back to the school. Clara is furious with the Doctor for abandoning them earlier. Could their travels be at an end? Clue - No, they aren't.

Journey 770: London, 2014, to Orient Express (in space), date unknown.
Unseen, the TARDIS will have left the school and returned to London sometime later. Despite their big falling-out last time, Clara has accepted one last trip. They arrive in the baggage car of the space-going replica of the Orient Express. The computer GUS puts a force-field around the ship. GUS has been trying to get the Doctor here for some time - having earlier almost tempted the Eleventh Doctor, Amy and Rory.

Journey 771: Orient Express to unknown planet, date unknown.
The Doctor rescues the survivors on the train before it blows up, and deposits them on an unspecified planet. Looks a bit like New New Earth, actually.

Journey 772: London, 2014, to Bristol, 2014.
Unseen, the Doctor will have taken Clara back home, then picked her up to take her to a meeting in the park with Danny Pink. Instead of arriving where he is, the ship ends up in Bristol - in somewhat reduced circumstances.
The TARDIS continues to shrink, with the Doctor trapped inside. Clara carries it around with her, but drops it when she is hiding from the Boneless in the train tunnels. The ship adopts "siege-mode" - appearing as a silver cube covered in Gallifreyan symbols. Clara tricks the Boneless into reconstituting the ship.

Journey 773: Bristol - tunnel to railway sidings, 2014.
The Doctor takes the ship back to its original landing site, its external dimensions now fully restored.

Journeys 774 & 775: Bristol to London, 2014, to London, 2014.
The Doctor takes Clara back home, then travels to Trafalgar Square. Overnight, the planet has become densely forested.

Journey 776: London to Earth orbit, 2014.
The Doctor takes Clara into space where they see the forest protect the planet from the solar flares.
Unseen, he will have taken her back home afterwards.

Journey 777: London, 2014, to unknown planet, date unknown.
Danny has been killed in a road traffic accident. Clara finally gets hold of the Doctor by phone. He is on a strange rocky planetoid.

Journeys 778 & 779: Unknown planet, date unknown, to Shoreditch, 2014, to the City of London, 2014.
The Doctor travels to Earth to pick up Clara. We see it visit a volcanic planet, but this proves to be all in Clara's mind. The gooey telepathic circuits come into play once more, as they direct the ship to where dead Danny might be found. This proves to be the 3W Foundation. This funerary complex turns out to be in a dimensional pocket within St Paul's Cathedral. This is all the work of the Master - now the Mistress. UNIT have the TARDIS transferred to Boat One, their presidential aircraft. When Missy escapes and the Cybermen attack, the TARDIS is sucked out of the hold. The Doctor is pulled out after it, but manages to freefall to the tumbling ship and get inside.

Journey 780: England, 2014 - mid-air to cemetery, location unknown.
The TARDIS materialises in the graveyard where Clara has been taken by Cyber-Danny.

Journeys 781 - 783: England, 2014, to Binary Co-ordinates 10-0-11-00 by 02, to London, 2014.
The Doctor goes looking for Gallifrey - at the co-ordinates given by Missy - but finds she has lied. He then travels to London to meet - and say farewell to - Clara. Those co-ordinates are where Gallifrey was before it was hidden in a pocket universe - first mentioned back in Pyramids of Mars.

Journey 784: London, 2014, to unknown planet, date unknown.
If you think I'm going to cover all that to-ing and fro-ing last Christmas, then dream on... No landings on a rooftop with Santa and his elves, or bases at the North Pole. All dreams. Never happened.
The Doctor wakes up on an unspecified planet, where he had been attacked by a Dream Crab.

Journey 785: Unknown planet, date unknown, to London, Christmas 2014.
Alerted to the danger to Clara from the Dream Crabs, the Doctor goes to rescue her. The tangerine on the windowsill, plus the fact that this is not the 60's block of flats where she is supposed to live, might suggest that this is also all just a dream...

TARDIS Travels No.35(a)

The first half of the Twelfth Doctor's travels. Last time, the TARDIS was leaving Trenzalore - and the new Doctor had to ask Clara if she knew how to pilot it. All three of the regenerations in the new series have involved the new Doctor crashing the TARDIS.

Journey 722: Trenzalore, date unknown, to Earth in prehistory.
The TARDIS lands in prehistoric Earth, where it gets swallowed by a Tyrannosaurus Rex.
Journey 723: Prehistoric Earth to London, 1890.
When the TARDIS dematerialises, it takes the surrounding dinosaur with it. The creature spits the ship out, and it lands on the Thames foreshore opposite the Houses of Parliament. Madam Vastra arranges for it to be transported to the yard at her home.

Journey 724: London, 1890, to London, 1890.
Once the Half-Face Man has been defeated, the Doctor disappears. Where he goes we do not know. He may simply have entered the Vortex for a while, or might have visited a dozen alien worlds. All we do know is that the ship returns to Vastra's home. The Doctor has redecorated - adding bookcases, comfortable furniture and a warmer lighting scheme.

Journey 725: London, 1890, to Glasgow, 2014.
The TARDIS arrives in the middle of the Scottish city. It was filmed in Cardiff, but does look a bit like Buchanan Street, where there is a real Police Call Box. Clara gets a phone call from the previous incarnation of the Doctor. The Doctor goes to get some coffee.

Journey 726: Glasgow, 2014, to unknown region of space, date unknown.
The TARDIS materialises on Journey Blue's spacecraft, just in time to save her before it is blown apart by a Dalek saucer. The Doctor has the coffee he went to collect in Glasgow.

Journey 727: Unknown region of space, date unknown - Journey's ship to the Aristotle medical vessel.
The Doctor takes Journey to the medical ship which is hidden among the asteroids. He meets the Dalek captive, which Journey's uncle wants him to treat.

Journey 728: Unknown region of space, date unknown, to Coal Hill School, London, 2014.
The Doctor finally delivers the coffee to Clara, the TARDIS materialising in the stationery cupboard at the school where she works. She has just met Danny Pink for the first time.

Journey 729: Coal Hill School, London, 2014, to Aristotle, unknown region of space, date unknown.
The Doctor takes Clara to meet the Dalek, which he will nickname "Rusty".

Journey 730: Aristotle, to Coal Hill School, London, 2014.
The Doctor takes Clara back to the stationery cupboard. Danny is surprised that she has changed her clothes in a matter of seconds, whilst still at school.

Journey 731: Coal Hill School, 2014, to Sherwood Forest, Nottinghamshire, c.1190.
Clara gets to choose where they go next.She wants to meet Robin Hood, whom the Doctor tries to convince her cannot possibly exist... We see an arrow embed itself in the TARDIS shell for the third time. We also get to see it self-repair when the Doctor pulls it out.

Journeys 732 & 733: Sherwood Forest to London 2014 to Earth orbit, 2014.
Unseen, the Doctor has taken Clara home. He then travels into space and meditates on top of the ship in orbit around the Earth. He develops a theory about evolution. Does the thing you think you see out of the corner of your eye, the thing that lurks under your bed, really exist? Could there be a creature that has the perfect camouflage?

Journey 734: Earth orbit to Africa, date unknown.
To explore his theory further, the Doctor visits the Savannah somewhere in Africa.

Journey 735: Africa, date unknown, to bottom of the ocean, date unknown.
More explorations - this time on the sea bed. Somewhere where they have puffer fish.

Journey 736: Seabed, date unknown, to London, 2014.
The Doctor travels to Clara's flat, materialising in the bedroom. He becomes disconcerted by her triple mirror. Does she need it because her face is so wide?

Journey 737: London, 2014, to Gloucester, 1990's.
First sight of the new telepathic circuits. A bank of gelatinous panels on the console that you stick your hands into. The Doctor wants to visit somewhere significant in Clara's past, but she gets distracted by thoughts of Danny after a disastrous dinner date and so they end up in his childhood instead - a children's home that he stayed in.

Journey 738: Gloucester, 1990's, to London, 2014.
The Doctor takes Clara back to the scene of that dinner date so that she can salvage the situation.
Journeys 739 & 740: London, 2014, to unknown planet, end of the universe, to London, 2014.
Unseen, the Doctor goes into the far future and collects Danny's (and Clara's?) descendant Orson Pink, who is an explorer. This is due to the telepathic circuit once more. Orson was supposed to travel a short time into the future, but ended up at the end of the universe. The Doctor brings him back to the restaurant where Clara is meeting Danny.

Journey 741: London, 2014, to unknown planet at the end of time.
The TARDIS travels to Orson's time-ship, as the Doctor assumes that his theoretical creature will have survived until the end of the universe. He wants to see it, but doesn't get the chance.

Journey 742: Unknown planet, end of the universe, to Gallifrey, date unknown.
The telepathic circuit once more plays a part, as the TARDIS arrives in the Doctor's childhood. It materialises in a barn where he liked to sleep on his own. Clara inadvertently plants the Doctor's latest obsession in his head. She is the thing under his bed. Strictly speaking, the TARDIS should not have been able to land on Gallifrey, as it has been out of bounds due to the Time War and subsequently hidden in a pocket universe. Then again, the Time War has leaked like a sieve...

Journeys 743 & 744: Gallifrey, date unknown, to London, 22nd Century, to London, 2014.
First Orson is taken home, then Clara.

Journeys 745 & 746: London, 2014, to date and location unknown, to London, 2014.
The Doctor goes off somewhere unknown, then arrives back at Clara's flat. He has a trip in mind when the phone in the TARDIS door starts to ring.
Journey 747: London, 2014, to spaceship in orbit around unnamed planet, date unknown.
The planet is home to the Bank of Karabraxos. The Doctor, Clara and new friends Saibra and Psi find themselves with their memories wiped, and involved in a bank heist. They discover that the TARDIS is parked on an orbiting spaceship.

Journey 748: Spaceship orbiting unknown planet, date unknown, to unknown planet, date unknown.
The Doctor and Clara take the Teller creature and its mate to a new home.

Journeys 749 - 751: Unknown planet, date unknown to same, to same, to London, 2014.
The Doctor takes Saibra, Psi and Clara to their respective homes and times.
Journey 752: London, 2014, to unknown planet, date unknown.
Now that he has worked out that he is the mastermind behind the heist - really a rescue - the Doctor has to travel back to the Bank at a slightly earlier time in order to set up the adventure that he has just experienced.

Journeys 753 & 754: Unknown planet, date unknown, to London, 2014, to unknown planet, date unknown.
After setting up the Karabraxos affair, the Doctor returns to London and picks up Clara for her next trip - and they find themselves chained up in a harsh desert landscape, with sand piranhas...
Journey 755: Unknown desert planet to London, 2014.
Danny is surprised that Clara has developed a tan since he last saw her - earlier that same day...

Journey 756: London, 2014, to Atlantis (?), date unknown.
The Doctor takes Clara to meet some Fish People. Probably not the Fish People from The Underwater Menace, but it would be nice to think that it was.
Journey 757: Atlantis (?), date unknown, to London, 2014.
Danny wonders why Clara has seaweed in her hair when they embark on another date...

Journey 758: London, 2014, to location and date unknown.
We see the Doctor and Clara running for their lives through a futuristic labyrinth, an unseen pursuer firing laser weapons at them.
Journey 759: Unknown location and date, to London, 2014.
An exhausted Clara has to go for a jog with Danny...

Journey 760: London, 2014 - Clara's flat to Coal Hill School.
The Doctor takes up the temporary position of caretaker at Clara's school. The TARDIS is parked in the janitor's storeroom. The Doctor has no qualms about showing the ship's interior to young Kourtney Woods - believing she is the same age as Clara.

Journeys 761 & 762: Coal Hill School - caretaker's area to assembly hall to caretaker's area.
The Doctor temporarily moves the TARDIS onto the stage of the assembly room where he planned to ensnare the Scovox Blitzer. Unfortunately Danny intervenes. He finds it all hard to take in - especially why Clara would be travelling in time and space with her dad... This does not endear him with the Doctor. The Doctor later takes the ship back to the caretaker's storeroom.

Journey 763: Coal Hill School, London, 2014, to unknown region of space, date unspecified.
Having managed to deactivate the Scovox Blitzer, the Doctor allows Kourtney to accompany him whilst he dumps it in deep space. Kourtney suffers from travel sickness. Get the paper towels...