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Players
(Terrance
Dicks) |
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 Name: Players
Format:
Book.
Time of Origin: Even they don't know
anymore.
Appearances: "World
Game", "Players"
and "Endgame".
Doctors:
Second
Doctor, Sixth
Doctor and Eighth
Doctor.
Companions: Serena and Peri.
History: The
Players like to view themselves as The Masters of Time, but the Sixth
Doctor called them vandals, children who throw bricks onto the lines of history
just to hear the train passengers scream, and the Second regarded them
as utterly evil, causing chaos and unrest on the whole of Earth simply
to keep themselves amused. The Players lives by strict Rules, which have
never been completely revealed in their appearances, but we do know their
cred, as shown below;
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Winning is everything - and nothing.
Losing is nothing - and everything.
All that matters is the Game. |
To
date, we aren't even clear on the nature of the Player's
time travelling abilities; the most logical conclusion would
be, of course, that they
come from the future and meddle in the past, but there are
hints that they live time contemporarily with Earth's present,
although their long
lives mean it has little effect on them, so it would also
seem likely that they have some means of seeing the future,
and thus know what to
do to alter it. Recent discoveries in "World
Game", however, suggest
that, in a sense, both are correct; the Players are transdimensional
beings, many of them dwelling in the higher plains of reality,
but there are hints in "Players" that
some of them live permanently on Earth, watching as events unfold around
them while remaining in contact with
the other Players. One thing that we do know about the Players
is that, as their cred suggests, they hold the Game above
all else, even above their own
lives. Some small details are known about their rules, such
as they never let it be known that they are manipulating
events, until they had their
encounters with The Doctor, as recounted below.
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World
Game
(Terrance Dicks) |
|
To
begin at the beginning, the Second
Doctor was the first one to encounter
the Players, as told by the Sixth Doctor in a flashback in ‘Players’.
Following the events of "The
War Games", the Second Doctor
would have been sentenced to forced regeneration and exile
on Earth, as he was for the majority of the Third
Doctor's era.
However, the Time Lord Celestial Intervention Agency requested
he work for them
for a while, which explains not only his older appearance
in 'The Five Doctors' and 'The Two Doctors', but the fact
that in ‘The Two Doctors’,
he was serving the Time Lords with Jamie, who’d presumably been
returned to him as assistance for that adventure. However,
The Doctor insisted on confirming that the War Games were
ended, so he was sent
to 1915 Earth, where he met up with two friends from the
Games, Lieutenant Jeremy Carstairs and Lady Jennifer Buckingham.
Just before he left, however,
the three of them met up with none other than Winston Churchill,
future WWII Prime Minister, and saved him from an attack.
While continuing, The Doctor, Carstairs, Lady Jennifer, and Churchill
arrived
in a mysterious
house owned by a Count and Countess, who tried to send Churchill
and the others to Germany. However, when they were being
taken onto the plane,
the Countess slipped Churchill a gun, which The Doctor than
grabbed and held the Count and Countess down while his friends
escaped, then using
the Time Ring given to him by the Time Lords to escape before
he was shot.
Following
this, The Doctor, along with his new companion Serenadellatrovella, began
to track the Players throughout the course of another elaborate scheme.
While his earlier encounter with the Players, and his meetings with them
in his sixth incarnation, featured The Doctor getting involved in the
Players' 'Game of Churchill and Hitler', featuring the Players attempting
to alter the events of the Second World War, in this encounter, The Doctor
found himself fighting in the 'Game of Napoleon and Wellington', as the
Countess masterminded a particularly ambitious scheme to alter the course
of the battle of Waterloo. Taking a gamble to find out exactly WHAT the
Countess was planning, The Doctor travelled on to 1865 in this alternate
timeline, and learned what the Countess had been planning; having taken
Napoleon out of the equation after he'd won the Battle of Waterloo due
to the Duke of Wellington's death, she had divided France among various
other Players, all of whom were now constantly at war against each other,
changing history now and again just for the heck of it.
Desperate
to prevent that timeline from coming into existence, The Doctor and Serena
travelled back to a ball that took place the day before Waterloo, where
the Duke of Wellington had been shot and killed. The assassination attempt
was averted, but at the cost of Serena's life, leaving The Doctor to
stick around for the battle to ensure that everything went according
to plan. The Countess nearly changed things at the last minute by preventing
the Prussians from coming to Wellington's aid, but, by posing as Napoleon,
The Doctor was able to get through the battleground and deliver vital
instructions to ensure things worked out the way they should; he was
even able to divert other military forces to where they'd do the least
historical damage.
(AN:
Evidence suggests that this encounter, for the Players, took place some
time after the Sixth Doctor's encounter with them as shown below, given
that they referred to 'The Game of Hitler and Churchill' in the past
tense, suggesting that it had happened some time ago for them)
After
a prolonged period where they somehow managed to avoid ever coming into
contact, the Players and The Doctor found themselves pitted against each
other again, The Doctor now in his sixth incarnation, and once again playing
the 'Game of Churchill and Hitler'. The time-period in question was 1899,
and the Players were attempting to shoot the younger Winston Churchill
during the Boer War, which was only barley prevented by the Sixth Doctor
and Peri when, The Doctor having decided to give Peri a holiday in Victorian
London, the TARDIS hit the right time, but landed in Africa during the
Boer War instead of in London. Following their rescue of Churchill from
a rogue sniper, The Doctor and Peri were briefly held prisoner with him
in a prison camp. However, Churchill managed to escape with the aid of
a Player who was then trying to save him, and The Doctor and Peri thanks
to a guard telling Peri where the TARDIS was.
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The Ancestor Cell
(Peter Anghelides
and Stephen Cole) |
|
The
Doctor's next encounter took place for him almost immediately after
his 1899 adventure, but for the Players it was thirty-seven years.
When The Doctor arrived on Earth, he and Peri managed to get invitations
to a garden party at Buckingham Palace, guarded by none other than
P.I. Tom Dekker, who met the Seventh
Doctor in "Blood
Harvest" and
helped him stop a plot to resurrect the Great Vampire. The Doctor
and Dekker talked with Churchill and Carstairs, now Churchill's chief
of staff, over the situation while Peri went to a meal with Wallis
Simpson, the King's mistress, Joachim von Ribbentrop of the Third
Reich, and the Count and Countess. Although Peri was captured, The
Doctor, Dekker and Dekker's friend, known as the Op, rescued her.
Churchill revealed that the King was apparently going to abdicate,
but The Doctor realised that he was going to instead dismiss the
Government and bring Britain under German rule. However, with advance
warning, Churchill managed to persuade the head of the BBC to record
the message, and only broadcast it at his orders. The plan succeeded,
but then the Count and Countess confronted Peri and The Doctor. Although
the Count was accidentally shot by the Countess, the Countess departed
leaving The Doctor a chilling message - they were now aware of him,
and, as either a Piece or a Player, he would play the Game again…
In
The Doctor's last encounter with the Players, he was in his eighth
incarnation, and was now about halfway through the 'Stuck on Earth'
arc of stories, following the aftermath of "The
Ancestor Cell". By
this point, all Players but the Countess had tired of Earth, and
had begun to set events into an Endgame by increasing the intensity
of the Cold War. Play would only end when one side had completely
destroyed the other, and if Earth was destroyed, well, that was just
unfortunate... as well as other additional rules, such as 'points'
being gained for eliminating old enemies such as The Doctor. Unfortunately
for the world at this time, the Eighth Doctor had now given up all
hope of ever remembering who he was- probably increased by his near
meeting with the Seventh Doctor and Ace following the events in "Timewyrm:
Exodus" - and spent his days at a library and his nights
in his flat near to the TARDIS, now almost with the exterior restored,
but
the
interior still smaller than the outside (His time at the library
was constantly frustrating him, as in most cases reading the books
in the library felt like refreshing his memory rather than learning
something new). However, The Doctor still got unwillingly involved
as a Piece in the Endgame thanks to a Russian leaving stolen documents
in his apartment, he got captured when attempting to get them out
of his way, and was eventually forced into getting involved when
a man named Philby blackmailed him into helping them by refusing
to return his impounded TARDIS.
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Endgame
(Terrance Dicks) |
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While
attempting to get double agent Douglas Maclean out of the country,
The Doctor was attacked by a Player named Axel, who attempted to
increase the hostility by embarrassing British Intelligence, but
The Doctor managed to overpower him. Even after all this, The Doctor
as still reluctant to get involved, and only continued because he
would go down if Earth went. The Players even attempted to brainwash
President Truman into increasing the war, but The Doctor managed
to destroy the machine. Still The Doctor was determined to get away
from the whole affair, but Philby framed The Doctor for espionage
and he was forced to do as Philby wanted and discover if the Players
were influencing Stalin as well. At this time, he encountered his
old enemy the Countess. However, while they argued, she realised
that not only did he not recognise her, but also he no longer possessed
his former joy of living. She almost restored his memories, but when
The Doctor collapsed, screaming 'I mustn't know! I mustn't know!'
she undid the damage for his sake and had a watcher to the event
take The Doctor to safety. In the final battle, the Players almost
succeeded, but the Countess decided that there were more Games to
be played on Earth, and made the Players kill each other.
Philby's
name was cleared officially, although he would remain under suspicion for
years to come. He used his influence to erase The Doctor's criminal record,
took him back to London and returned his mysterious blue box. The Doctor
put the intrigue of the Cold War behind him, but his recent adventures
had dealt with on problem - they had cured his depression; once again,
he was beginning to take pleasure in the little things in life. Meanwhile,
the Countess reported to her head, the Adjudicator, that she failed to
influence Stalin and Truman's bodyguards killed her opponents. Although
suspicious, the Adjudicator accepted her claims, and declared the Endgame
void. Although the Players presumably remain somewhere, it is possible
that a future Doctor shall deal with them in the end, but whether the Tenth
Doctor, or other future Doctors, shall meet them again remains to be seen. |
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