A History of the Whoniverse

The Twenty-first Century (2001-2100)

As the 21st century began, Earth was in a sorry state. The environmental damage of the last few centuries had begun to take its toll on the Earth. During the first decade of the century, this showed in many ways. Weather patterns became much less stable. Global warming caused rising sea levels. Holland and Venice were among the areas submerged over the course of the century. The climate of Kent became warm enough to plant vineyards. Low-lying ozone and nitrogen dioxide often forced people to wear facemasks in London and New York. The Antarctic icecaps continued to break up, whilst marine ecosystems were under severe threat from pollution [and overfishing]. Water shortages were increasingly common and even London and Toronto used standpipes and water rationing. Ozone holes made sunbathing perilous and caused severe damage in the US State of Oregon. The Plague, a collection of fatal diseases such as HIV 7 [a particularly dangerous strain of AIDS] and other diseases took hold. [These were presumably caused by pollution, genetically modified foods, and suchlike.] Britain was subject to acid rain and greater air turbulence made air travel more dangerous.

Despite this devastation, Westerners were reluctant to cut back their material standard of living to prevent it. Gridlock was the norm in cities and motorbikes replaced London's traditional black cabs. In New York, taxi drivers were heavily armed, and offered in-car entertainment such as bars and television to keep passengers occupied during gridlock. Car owners took to working on laptops in traffic jams. Earth's population was rapidly approaching 8 billion [and Earth was on the brink of not producing enough food to be able to feed everyone].

The catalogue of environmental devastation and the continuation of environmentally damaging practices mostly come from Cat's Cradle: Warhead and Iceberg. The sinking of Holland is from St. Anthony's Fire. That of Venice is from The Empire of Glass. Although this last event is not dated, it happened centuries before Steven's or Vicki's time, so I have placed it here, where it fits nicely.

Accompanying this environmental chaos was an increase in the breakdown of Western society. All sorts of terrorist groups sprang up. Out of the environmental movement came groups such as Earth for Earth. Separatist movements sprang up everywhere, as did nationalists and anarchists. The initials IFA, PPO, and TCWC became synonymous with violence. In both the UK and the US, the upcoming youth culture spawned groups such as the Gameboys, the Witchkids, and the Crows. These groups were addicted to computer games and smashed up machinery. The Witchkids' fire-bombing of a McDonald's on the M2 and their ritual sacrifice of the customers became a watchword for the new millennium. Rioting or civil war became the norm worldwide. In the US right-wingers seized control and ended immigration, [even for obviously genuine asylum seekers] and restricted movement of the unemployed. The Connors amendment enabled martial law and the death penalty. Heavily armed private police confined the underclass in slums.

Military technology also advanced. Vickers developed a helmet that could fire any compatible gun by the action of blinking. The sheer number of accidental deaths caused by the system led to it being banned by military organisations worldwide. However, it continued being a best-seller in the private sector.

Popular culture reflected this breakdown of society. In Britain, SlapRap became the teenage music. The Kinki Gerlinki revival led to outrageous and obscene clothing fashions. The sitcom Naked Decay topped the TV charts. Mike Brack's Masks of Decay exhibition featured wax lumps hacked into caricatures of major celebrities. On Pentonville Road, London, the SaferSex emporiums featured teledonic suits. American children watched the pumpkin faced killer Jack Blood and collected Cthulu Gate comics and VR game modules. American teenagers became Oi Boys, skinheads patterned after the [right wing] fashions of Eastern Europe.

These social details come from Cat's Cradle: Warhead and Iceberg.

During the early years of this century, there was a Neo-Gothic revival.

Strange England.

c. 2001

SHORT TRIPS COMPANIONS: DISTANCE

Barbara Chesterton learns that she has cancer at the same time as Dr Frank Ellis, a former colleague of her husband Ian, dies in hospital of a strange type of dermoid cyst.

Ian says that he is about as old as the Doctor was on page 109, obviously referring to the first Doctor's apparent age of about 65.

2001

HEAD GAMES

A lone gunman shoots the Queen in Sheffield, yet she survives without a scratch. UNIT forces, led by Brigadier Bambera, are subsequently involved in an assault on Buckingham Palace. Bambera had recently given birth to twins.

It's 2001 (page 149), some time before December 2001 (page 201), and 953 years before Chris is born (page 150).

LUNGBARROW

Dorothée is attacked by a gendarme in Paris, after he finds her bike in an alleyway.

It's 2001 on page 12 / Chapter 1 page 4.

Rose Tyler starts dating Mickey Smith.

According to the character guide to Rose by Russell T Davies in the 2005 Doctor Who Annual, which dates it as when she was 14.

2002

Mickey Smith's grandmother dies when she slips on the stairs.

Rose says that this happened five years before Rise of the Cybermen, when she was still in school.

Rose Tyler is suspended from Jericho Street Comprehensive for three days after she persuades the school choir to go on strike. In the summer she sits GCSEs getting one A, two Bs, 4 Cs, and a D in science. She plans to sit A-Levels in English, French, and Art until - in September - she falls in love with 20-year-old Jimmy Stone and moves in with him. At some point during this relationship, they went on an ill-fated camping trip to Dartmoor.

According to the character guide by Russell T Davies in the 2005 Doctor Who Annual. The camping trip comes from Only Human page 63.

March 2002

Sarah Jane Smith's short story A Girl's Best Friend is published in Metropolitan magazine.

Decalog 3: Moving On (page 74).

30th November 2002

Ace reduces the death count of an incident involving the gunman Murdoch from 5 to 3.

This is as far as she can go forwards with Kadiatu's hoppers.

2003

Ruby Duvall becomes a reporter for the Sunday Seeker.

Three years before Iceberg.

February 2003

Rose Tyler moves out of Jimmy Stones' bedsit �800 in debt after he goes to Amsterdam in a campervan with a woman called Noosh. She gets a job at the Christmas Shop on Clifton's Parade.

Five months after moving in with him in September, according to the character guide to Rose by Russell T Davies in the 2005 Doctor Who Annual.

August 2003

Rose Tyler gets a job at the Henrik's Department Store thanks to a favour from one of her mum's old boyfriends, Geoff Moon.

According to the character guide to Rose by Russell T Davies in the 2005 Doctor Who Annual, which says it was 6 months after getting her previous job.

25th December 2003

ATTACK OF THE GRASKE

A Graske replaces two members of a Welsh family with Graske duplicates. This replacement may have been temporary.

The Doctor says that the 1883 scenes are about a hundred and twenty years before this sequence. I arbitrarily assume that the figure is exact.

November 2004

Chuck Norris is elected President of the United States. One of his policies would be the economic opportunity initiative - the unemployed would be forbidden from travelling to find work.

Interference (book 1 page 141) establishes that Bruce Springsteen is succeeded by Norris, and the beginning of Norris' economic opportunity initiative is described as coinciding with "the good years" and being "a long time ago" in Cat's Cradle: Warhead (page 26), and "years" ago on page 42. So Norris has to be in his second term in Warhead.

Clive tracks down a picture of the (ninth) Doctor in the Washington Public Archive.

He says that this happened "just last year" in Rose

2005

Scientists, who already knew that Earth's magnetic field could invert, had become seriously worried about it. New calculations had shown that such a reversal was due about this time. [Media coverage of this new threat forced] world governments [probably under the auspices of the UN] to set up the FLIPback project. This project planned to be to reverse the orientation itself, thus eliminating potentially catastrophic effects. Soon after the project was established at what used to be the Snowcap Tracking Centre in the Antarctic, the hovercraft AXV9 vanished. This incident reinforced the myth of the Torus Antarctica, an area of Antarctica that was prone to disappearances.

Iceberg.

The Witchkids petrol-bomb a McDonald's on the M2. They then ritually sacrifice all the customers. This event is hushed up.

Cat's Cradle: Warhead.

Vincent Wheaton walks in on his parents whilst they are arguing and his dad has just started beating his mother. His father grabs him, and Vincent uses his power for the first time, channelling his father's emotion into telekinesis, causing his father to be injured.

According to Cat's Cradle: Warhead pages 151-152. This was when Vincent was 10.

Jackie Tyler nails down the cat flap in her flat's front door.

In Rose she says that she did this "weeks back".

A Greek woman called Arianna gets �2000 off a London Council because the man behind the counter says that she looks Greek.

According to Rose's mum in Rose. No date is given.

5th-6th March 2005

ROSE

There is a major fire caused by an explosion in Central London Department Store Hendrik's. The next day, there is a disturbance in a Central London Pizza restaurant when a customer morphs his hands into paddles and smashes up the restaurant, even after his head has been pulled off. Later that night, the London Eye is reported to have been lit up with an electrical fire and shop dummies come to life in a number of London (and probably non-London) shops - most notably the Queen's Arcade. Elton Pope is one of the people who survives the shop dummy attacks.

The Search-Wise website has a copyright date of 1995-2004, and Mickey's tax disc runs out in March 2005. Clive mentions that his family have been spending summer money in winter months. The Aliens of London establishes the date of Rose's disappearance. The BBC's mock-up UNIT website dates this as the 26th of March 2006. Elton was shown to be there in Love & Monsters

June 2005

A disposable personal organiser came with the June edition of Der Speigel.

The Doctor uses one of these free personal organisers in Transit (page 146).

ONLY HUMAN

There is a fight in a Bromley nightclub at a fancy dress night. One of the participants is dressed as a caveman. Rumours say that the caveman stinks and is probably a drunk, a drug addict, and a tramp. He is taken to Southam Hospital, and is the cause of an E-Bola scare, which causes the hospital to be evacuted. Over the next month, two men called Das Dimitru and Jack Harkness rent a flat in London. Jack disappears when the month is up, but Das gets a job as a builder and gets engaged to a girl called Anna Marie O'Grady.

The year is given on page 9.

2006

March 2006

THE ALIENS OF LONDON / WORLD WAR THREE

A spacecraft crashes in the Thames, Central London, damaging the Westminster Clock Tower in the process. There is a national state of emergency declared, and flights are grounded in the USA. The Prime Minister is unavailable for comment, and a body is brought ashore and taken to the mortuary at Albion hospital. There are at least 3 assaults on people falsely accused of being aliens. MP Joseph Green is installed as acting Prime Minister, being the most senior MP able to get to Downing Street. He holds a press conference outside Downing Street. He claims that the greatest experts in extra-terrestrial affairs were murdered by aliens - that they have a mothership hovering above the UK which has massive weapons of destruction capable of being deployed in 45 seconds. He begs the United Nations to release the access codes to the UK's nuclear weapons so they can destroy the aliens. The UN Security Council agrees to release the codes at the same time as a missile hits Downing street, destroying the building. The only survivor is Harriet Jones, MP for Flydale North. She informs the world that the crisis is over. Elton Pope is one of the people who witnesses the spaceship flying overhead.

It is repeatedly said to have been a year since Rose, and one of Jackie's missing posters says that the date of Rose's disappearance was the 6th of March 2005. The BBC's mock-up UNIT website dates this from the 26th to 28th of March 2006. Elton's presence is seen in Love & Monsters

One Slitheen escapes with a personal teleportation device, and materialises in a skip on the Isle of Dogs. However, some Slitheen did not come to Earth, but survived elsewhere. They were forced out of the fuel-sale business when a rival family called the Blathereen undercut them and stole their customers by being better organised, more streamlined, and having lower overheads. When their firm went bust, the Slitheen turned to chizzle-waxing.

According to Boom Town and The Monsters Inside page 53-54.

Harriet Jones becomes Prime Minister with a landslide majority. She will ultimately go on to become a three-term Prime Minister, ushering in Britain's golden age.

Harriet's three terms and golden age are mentioned in World War Three and her landslide is mentioned in The Christmas Invasion. The election happens somewhere between the two stories.

Mrs McGregor, a resident of Bucknall House on the Powell Estate in London starts wandering around the streets in her nightie, believing that it is still during World War Two. "Her Tony" puts her in a home in Sydenham, and the Council puts Mrs Pye (and, thus, her son Darren) into her old flat.

At some point between Rose and Winner Takes All page 18. Tony's relationship to Mrs McGregor isn't stated.

Klebanov decommissions the missiles on the St Petersburg submarine in Novrosk, or so he says.

This was "last year" from The Deviant Strain pages 226-228.

WINNER TAKES ALL

A new scratchcard game begins in the shopping centre nearest to the Powell Estate in London. Every item brought wins you a scratchcard, and winning cards either get you a new games console, complete with the game Death to Mantodeans, or a free holiday. Most of those who win the free holiday are never seen again. But the promotion is soon abandoned when the Porcupine-costumed people running it disappear themselves. Meanwhile, on the planet Toop, the Porcupine-like Quevvils launch an attack on their Preying Mantis-like enemies the Mantodeans, but the troops sent are killed whilst teleporting into the Mantodean stronghold.

It's clearly after Aliens of London/World War Three and before Boom Town.

Kadiatu Lethbridge-Stewart publishes a controversial best seller The Zen Military: A History of UNIT. This book revealed many of the details of UNIT's activities during the early 1970's. Kadiatu was the granddaughter of Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart and Mariatu.

The date of Kadiatu's book was originally given in the novelisation of Remembrance of the Daleks. In Transit (page 184) Alistair's granddaughter Kadiatu, a historian, is mentioned. In Set Piece, the other Kadiatu Lethbridge-Stewart says that she's read her grandmother's book and mentions the date 2006, though it's uncertain whether this is the date of the book.

September 2006

BOOM TOWN

The new mayor in Cardiff (Margaret Blaine) announces a new project - a nuclear power plant called Blaidd Drwg in the heart of Cardiff. The project is associated with a lot of deaths - the (French) European Safety Inspectors are all killed when "danger explosives" is only written in Welsh. The Cardiff Heritage Committee are killed by an electrocuted swimming pool, put down to wear and tear. The Architects are killed when the Mayor's car couldn't stop due to rain and low visibility. Mr Cleaver, the Government's Nuclear Advisor, slips on an icy patch and is decapitated. Before he dies, Mr Cleaver posts some of his findings online, that the reactor design is fundamentally unstable, and liable to cause an accident worse than Chernobyl. The day the project is unveiled to the press, Cardiff is hit by freak storms and an earthquake caused by the opening of a time rift, and the mayor disappears.

A caption in the pre-titles sequence dates this to 6 months after Aliens of London/World War Three.

THE PARTING OF THE WAYS

Rose Tyler arrives back on Earth in the TARDIS, and persuades Mickey and her mum to help her open the heart of the TARDIS, which happens when Jackie calls in a favour to get a breakdown recovery truck, which pulls open the relevant section.

The scenes on "contemporary" Earth aren't dated, but they are clearly after Boom Town.

Dorothy McShane was still listed in a pan-European database of missing persons at this time.

Set Piece, page 184.

November/December 2006

ICEBERG

Ruby Duvall takes a cruise on the liner SS Elysium. She reports on the cruise for the Sunday Seeker. Also on board is sculptor Mike Brack, who is scheduled to sculpt heads from rogue icebergs near Antarctica.

Meanwhile, the UN-funded FLIPback project reverses the inversion of Earth's magnetic field. Although no one remembers, a CyberFaction invasion was prevented at this time.

The story runs from Early November (p25), through Friday 26th December (p1) to Wednesday 1st January (p251).The FLIPback staff are under mind control, and so shouldn't remember the invasion, and the Doctor hypnotises all those on the Elysium except Ruby. Given this, it's surprising that Hegelia knows of the invasion in Killing Ground.

24th-25th December 2006

THE CHRISTMAS INVASION

The Guinevere One space probe is due to land on Mars, with photographs of Mars to be received by midnight on the 24th/25th December. Contact is lost for a few seconds. When the first pictures are received, and broadcast on live TV, they show an alien life form. This is quickly dismissed as a hoax caused by students hijacking the signal although NATO forces are reported to be on full alert. When morning comes in the UK, large numbers of people walk to the top of nearby high buildings and go to the edge, apparently ready to jump off. Prime Minister Harriet Jones goes on the TV - appealing to people to remain calm, and appealing for someone called "the Doctor" to "help us". Immediately after this appeal, a sonic wave hits London, shattering windows across the city. A large spacecraft then appears over London. Shortly after this, the people on the edge of the rooves come to their senses - acting like they've been hypnotised. Minutes after that, the alien ship travels away, but it is blown up by a large energy weapon which fires out from somewhere in London. However, UK news coverage is soon occupied with rumours that the Prime Minister's health is failing. Elton Pope is one of the people who witness the spaceship over London.

It is clearly Christmas and is after The Parting of the Ways for Jackie and Mickey. Harriet seems new to the Prime Minister's job - being unused to having a right-hand man, whilst there is scaffolding on St Stephen's Tower - presumably from Aliens of London, meaning that it is probably 2006. Elton's presence is established in Love & Monsters

LOVE & MONSTERS

Elton Pope stumbles across Ursula Blake's blog. He meets her and joins a group she is part of who are looking for the Doctor. They meet up every week. Elton coins a name for the group: "London Investigators 'N' Detective Agency" or LINDA. Over time, the group become strong friends and branch out into new things such as music.

Sarah Jane Smith publishes her final 'Doctor' novel.

This is ten years after Decalog 3: Moving On (page 71) - so it's 2006. It's several years after A Hand Through Time was published in 2001 (page 72, 74).

2007

NEW EARTH

The Doctor and Rose say goodbye to Mickey and Jackie before leaving in the TARDIS

It is unclear whether this is immediately after The Christmas Invasion or after a later visit.

January 2007

An exhibition entitled Arms for Humanity is staged in Panama. Arms for Humanity is sponsored by shady multinational PPI. Proceeds go to the Preserve Our Planet Fund.

Iceberg.

[The Arms for Humanity Exhibition was the first major event in what became known as The Big Clean Up. PPI was the first major corporation to recognise that they could make vast sums of money out of cleaning up the planet. By doing this, they profited twice over for environmental devastation.] PPI's major contribution was in realising that icebergs from the Antarctic could be converted into a vast supply of drinking water, which water-starved nations would be willing to pay extortionate amounts of money to obtain.

Iceberg. The Big Clean Up is first suggested in Ben Aaronovitch's Future History Continuity for Virgin publishing.

Stephanie arrives in New York to work for the Butler Institute, having previously worked for Texas Instruments.

She's been in New York for nearly 18 months by Cat's Cradle: Warhead page 61.

Deffrey Vale school obtains a new headmaster. At the same time, half of the teachers get flu and are replaced, as are several of the dinner ladies. A new curriculum is introduced, and from then on there are a number of children who get ill. Some of them disappearing completely.

Three months before School Reunion.

1st February 2007

RISE OF THE CYBERMEN / THE AGE OF STEEL

In an alternative universe where Great Britain has a President, there is a country called New Germany, rich people own Zeppelins, and the immensely powerful Cybus Corporation provides download services straight to the brain through earpieces, John Lumic - Cybus Corporation's owner - creates a race of Cybermen from people living on the streets. He uses them to assassinate the President and begin converting the population of London. However, his conversion factory is destroyed, and his Cybermen made to self-destruct.

Mickey finds a newspaper dated 1st February "this year", presumably the same year as School Reunion.

SCHOOL REUNION

One of the science teachers at Deffrey Vale leaves rather suddenly, having had a winning lottery ticket pushed through her door at midnight. Three days after her replacement - John Smith - begins, the school is destroyed in an unexplained explosion. The children at the school all got out in time, but the teachers all died in the explosion.

Sarah mentions the spaceship over London from The Christmas Invasion as being "this Christmas just gone", making it early 2007.

THE AGE OF STEEL

The Doctor and Rose arrive back in the real universe, materialising in Jackie's flat.

This is after School Reunion and before Love & Monsters

THE DEVIANT STRAIN

Satellites detect an energy spike in Novrosk, northern Russia, the site of several decommissioned nuclear submarines. The Russian authorities send a detachment of 37 troops led by Colonel Oleg Levin to investigate. The soldiers had been returning from an operation in Chechnya, where they had lost 48 men. The details of the operation were never released, but they destroyed an alien spacecraft with the aid of the Doctor, though there were several casualties amongst the soldiers, the local villagers, and the staff of a local research institute.

The Doctor says that it's the early 21st Century on page 11, the Cold War was "coming to an end" 20 years ago on page 26, and there are mentions of the war in Chechnya and the sinking of the Kursk, which happened in August 2000. The exact date is arbitrary, but I've gone for 2007.

LOVE & MONSTERS

A man called Victor Kennedy walks into a LINDA meeting and takes over the group, making them work at finding the Doctor. Over the time that he is in charge, two members of the group apparently leave without saying goodbye. At one point, Elton briefly encounters the tenth Doctor and Rose, at which point Kennedy sends them all to try to find out who Rose is. Elton meets Jackie Tyler and becomes her friend. One night, Jackie tries to make it more than that, but then discovers that Elton was originally interested in her only to get at the Doctor. Soon afterwards, Elton discovers that Kennedy is an alien which has absorbed the other members of LINDA. He defeats it at the same time as properly meeting the Doctor and Rose, and the Doctor manages to rescue Ursula Blake when the alien dies, although she exists only as a head in a paving slab.

Elton discovered the group after The Christmas Invasion, and the meetings before Kennedy arrives must have happened over several months. He has to have met Jackie after The Age of Steel and the story ends before the Ghosts begin to appear two months before Army of Ghosts

A sphere comes out of the anomolous point in Torchwood Tower. The sphere defies all of Torchwood's attempts to analyse it. Torchwood soon discovers that firing particles at the anomoly generates large amounts of energy, as well as prompting ghostlike beings to appear across the world. They begin causing ghost shifts at regular intervals, attempting to turn it into a new power source. The world's population rapidly accepts the ghosts, and comes to believe that they are actually the ghosts of dead people.

The ghosts started appearing two months before Army of Ghosts.

ARMY OF GHOSTS/DOOMSDAY

A ghost shift is unexpectedly cut short just hours before the ghosts appear in force and then become physical beings - - metal men. One of them broadcasts a demand for surrender on global TV and radio networks. Subsequently, various armed forces fight back against them. During this war, there are reports of pepperpot-shaped beings appearing in the sky above London and attacking both humans and invaders. Both sets of aliens then appear to get sucked into Canary Wharf tower. Both Jackie Tyler and Rose Tyler are on the list of the dead, although neither woman's body would ever be found.

The ghost shifts must have started at some point after Love & Monsters. It has been three years since The Age of Steel on the parallel world, but cannot possibly be that long on the "real" one.

November 2008

Chuck Norris is either re-elected as President of the USA.

The president is named as Chuck in Cat's Cradle: Warhead (page 20).

2009

During this year, Australian troops were involved in a conflict in Indonesia. [Probably involving separatist groups or East Timorese oil].

Cat's Cradle: Warhead, pages 18 and 99.

Justine smashes up cars in West Kensington using a sledgehammer and petrol bombs.

According to Cat's Cradle: Warhead page 177-178, this was 3 days after she turned 17.

Phil Houseman's book The Myth of Artificial Intelligence is published.

We see an extract on page 122 of Theatre of War.

April 2009

Mulwray breaks into the Butler Institute's computer system. He discovers that a big Japanese company called Hoshino owns the Butler Institute, and the extent of the Butler Institute's holdings.

He says he did this in April on page 70 of Cat's Cradle: Warhead.

June 2009

Vincent Wheaton spots rare Cthulu Gate tie-in comic Talons #1 in his local store . As he leaves the store with the comic, he is confronted by Bobby Prescott, who wants to hurt him for his computer games obsession. He uses his powers for the second time, killing Bobby Prescott's three associates. Within a week, Calvin - a schoolmate who was there when it happened - has contrived to seal him in cryogenic suspension. Calvin and three friends go to Turkey to guard the capsule.

According to Cat's Cradle: Warhead pages 152-168. Page 153 says that it happened in June, a couple of weeks before the Summer Holidays. It is 2 decades since the riots, and is "a long time ago" relative to the main story on page 187. Given that Calvin and friends are in Vincent's school year, he is 14 when this happens (p152), and they are at most 14 on page 105, I assume this is the same year.

Mid August 2009

Shreela is moved to a new room

Two weeks before Cat's Cradle: Warhead page 9.

Late August-October 2009

CAT'S CRADLE: WARHEAD

The Butler Institute had developed a project to save the minds of the rich and powerful inside a computer. As the project was getting underway, there was a fracas near their New York offices - a hovercraft stolen from police impoundment crashes into the building. The next day, the project is destroyed by a freak blizzard.

The date is never stated. Shreela, one of Ace's mates from Perivale, dies at an unstated tragically early age on page 19. Halloween is on a Saturday (pages 199, 250), thus it's 1998, 2009 or 2015. Ace's clothes are 20 years out of date, making the middle date the most likely. Just War confirms that this is the 21st century. Ben Aaronovitch's Future History Continuity sets it c. 2007). On page 1 it's before the start of school in September, and on page 17 it's after the tenth of August. By page 140 it's October, and the last few chapters are over Halloween weekend.

Following the destruction of the only way to escape the destruction of Earth's ecosystem, the rich turned to combating the problem. Billions were poured into researching possible cures. Methods were found to patch up the ozone layer. Sophisticated traffic control systems were instituted on roads. [Together with massive promotion of public transport] this reduced traffic considerably. The effects were, however, barely felt in major cities like London. [Presumably there was also a massive shift towards renewable energy use. Furthermore, subsidies for pollutant industries were replaced by subsidies for energy-efficient devices and clean-up operations. Wind farms became common in rural areas, as did solar panels in urban areas. Eco-friendly products were heavily promoted and regulated. There were even companies set up solely to monitor the environmental impacts of other companies. Despite these vast changes, the mood was far from revolutionary. Driven as it was by the big corporations, the clean up was criticised by environmental groups for not going far enough to prevent disaster, and for being little more than a temporary fix.]

Some details are evident from the differences between Warlock and Cat's Cradle: Warhead. The end of Warhead suggests that the destruction of the Butler Institute's method of escape made the rich and powerful throw their weight behind clean-up efforts.

Early 21st Century

The Eisenck Portfolio version of the story of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is produced. The version could be described as neutered.

The Doctor dates this on page 16 of Alien Bodies.

2010

HAPPY ENDINGS

Days before the wedding of Bernice Summerfield and Jason Kane in Cheldon Boniface, locals clash with what they believe to be inhuman beings, possibly of extra-terrestrial origins. These beings later attended the wedding. In addition to these guests, others came in the guise of Sherlock Holmes, Doctor Watson, and the Isley Brothers. More normal visitors included Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, (who miraculously regained his youth during his visit) his wife Doris, John Benton, Mike Yates, Ace and Kadiatu Lethbridge-Stewart. Gatecrashers included Hamlet MacBeth and Ruby Duvall.

The date is clearly stated.

2011

Edward dies.

According to Countess Gallowglass in Relative Dementias (page 17), this was 'last year' from 2012.

Chloe Webber's father dies.

This was a year before Fear Her.

Geocomtex discovers the cure for common cold from bacteria found in a Russian crater. They keep it quiet so that they can make money from selling palliatives.

This was "last year" according to Van Statten in Dalek. The cure for the common cold is also mentioned in The Ark

2012

Worldwide, a number of international tensions had arisen. [In particular, India and Pakistan were at loggerheads, the Middle East was almost at war over water, Israeli/Arab tensions were hotting up, the former USSR was undergoing further break-up, and Indonesia was fighting numerous separatist groups.] In the midst of this, Salamander convinced a group of people that a nuclear war was inevitable [as these flashpoints all revolved around nations with nuclear weapons]. Before a war could have broken out, they established themselves in a nuclear shelter under Kanowa, Australia. [Shortly afterwards] there was a [nuclear] incident at Southport. [This was presumably an explosion or publicised near explosion of stockpiled nuclear weapons, possibly triggered by a terrorist attack.] After this, world governments realised that stockpiling nuclear weapons would only result in all-out nuclear warfare or serious nuclear accidents. They then reduced their stockpiles considerably.

Salamander's shelter is from The Enemy of the World. The Stockport Incident is mentioned by Benny in Just War. Zoe recognises a nuclear blast in The Dominators. Given her general ignorance of history, it seems unlikely that there were no nuclear weapons left by her era. Hey, it's pretty ridiculous to suggest that it could happen, anyway.

Peter Hinton's book The Greeks had a Play about It is published.

We see extracts on pages 273 and 290 of Theatre of War.

By this time, fashions included long coats in billowing, shiny parachute-like fabric and short hair cropped into whorls and circles.

According to Relative Dementias page 9.

SHORT TRIPS COMPANIONS: KEPT SAFE AND SOUND

K9 Mark 3 ends up on a market stall somewhere in England, where the owner plunders him for spare parts. When he is reduced to a brain module, his visor, and some vocal apparatus, he is rescued by a young teenager called Jack, who then records K9's memories and brain onto recordable CDs.

K9 hasn't spoken for 16 years by page 75, probably since Decalog 3: Moving On (hence my dating). However, the Series 2 story School Reunion is likely to completely change this dating.

DALEK

A Geocomtex complex rumoured to be a museum of extra-terrestrial artefacts, buried in the US state of Utah is abandoned after the deaths of 200 security staff. The complex is filled with cement and Geocomtex supremo Henry Van Statten disappears, being replaced by Diana Goddard.

The Doctor says that the year is 2012. Van Statten's comment about replacing the US President means that it has to be before March, as that would be the latest it would be possible to replace the president, given that Van Statten is happy to replace him with a candidate from either political party.

RELATIVE DEMENTIAS

The Doctor and Ace visit London to collect the Doctor's mail.

The date is given on page 13, and the back cover.

July 2012

FEAR HER

In the week before the London 2012 Olympics, several children disappear from Dame Kelly Holmes Close, reappearing on the day of the opening ceremony. On the day of the ceremony, the 80,000 people in the Olympic Stadium briefly disappear. Meanwhile, something that looks like a lightning bolt strikes the Olympic Torch. The torch bearer stumbles and falls at the entrance to the stadium, but an unknown individual picks up the torch and takes it to light the Olympic Flame. During the subsequent Olympics, Papua New Guinea surprise everybody in the Shot Put.

It's the day of the opening ceremony of the 2012 Olympics.

July 4th 2013

Something bad is due to happen in London on this date.

According to Countess Gallowglass in Relative Dementias (page 17).

Date Unknown

The Doctor is present as the first human clones are made. They are mindless, and intended to be used as stunt doubles in motion pictures.

This is said to have been thousands of years before Heritage page 268 (6048), and must be well before Deceit (26th Century), where we see a clone of Absalom Daak.

c. 2014

Organised crime had, by now, incorporated drug dealing. Sales of drugs increased when a new drug known as warlock came onto the market. The fight against this drug was more intense than the drug war had ever been. In the UK, police used their own model of Porsche in an attempt to match the speed of dealers' cars. Globally, the International Drug Enforcement Agency was set up from Interpol and the FBI. IDEA, headed by Henry Harrigan Jr., was based in the former headquarters of the Butler Institute in New York.

Warlock has been on the street for about a year before Warlock.

DEATH AND DIPLOMACY

In the Magellan Cluster, three empires were in a state of perfect symmetry. The devious Saloi, who could only think in terms of bluffs and double bluffs, the militaristic Czhans, and the savage Dakhaari were almost at war. Their rival claims to the planet Moriel would have resulted in an all-out conflict. The Hollow Gods, who had manipulated all three empires for generations, demand a diplomatic solution and employ the Doctor as an arbiter. Meanwhile, Bernice Summerfield meets Jason Kane.

Jason (born 1983) is 29 on page 35 and is 'near enough' 30 years old on page 123.

c. 2015

Autumn

WARLOCK

The drug warlock abruptly disappears from the streets shortly after IDEA officers are involved in the destruction of Canterbury Cathedral. This latter incident is blamed on a freak ball-lightning effect. At about the same time, an animal research lab near Canterbury is closed down following reports of experiments on humans. Also at this time, the gangster Paulie Keaton inexplicably loses control of organised crime in the city.

Cat's Cradle: Warhead was years ago. Vincent and Justine bought a car after a few years of marriage and have had it some time. Justine has grown up from a girl of maybe 16 or 17 to a woman. On the other hand, she's probably only a couple of years older than the medical student. It's therefore probably around five years since Warhead. It's late autumn.

About this time, synthetic bioluminescents (glow in the dark putty) become popular toys.

In State of Change (page 42) the Doctor dates this as about 30 years after Peri's time (c.1985).

[It was about this time that humanity began re-investing in space travel. The corporate development of cheap, reusable, rockets overrode former security considerations that had limited space travel. In short order, humans established the earliest moonbase. They also began developing plans for permanent space stations. It is possible that this exploration of space was intended as a prelude to terraforming other worlds in case the clean up failed. It would prove to be several decades before this revival of space travel would make a major impact on human history.] One application of this new technology was faster intercontinental travel via rocket. Shorter trips [began to be] made by hovercar. Several space stations were set up for defence reasons following numerous attempted alien invasions since the 1970s. They were armed with X-ray "lasers" and convolute force-fields. They were also used for message relays, ship stopovers, and research purposes. Over time, subsequent governments forgot the original motives for setting up these stations. To gain public favour, the utility and scientific value of the stations was stressed. These stations were increasingly staffed by specialists, whose ability at their job was top class, but whose horizons were incredibly narrow.

Stories such as The Moonbase and The Wheel in Space suggest that humanity revitalised at least one space programme during this century. Its placement here is arbitrary. The terrestrial transport details are from The Enemy of the World and the details of the space stations form the backgroung to The Wheel in Space.

At the same time, momentous political changes were occurring. [The globalisation trend became increasingly realised. Although the nation state was never abolished, regional alliances such as the EU, the AU, and NAFTA became the essential unit of government. Recognising of this trend, international bodies began restructuring. In particular, the United Nations became] the World Zones Authority, or the United Zones. Each Zone had a Controller [who was responsible for implementing global initiatives such as the clean up].

This is the political background to The Enemy of the World.

2016

Ramon Salamander invents Sun-Catcher, a global weather-control system.

A year before The Enemy of the World.

2017

THE ENEMY OF THE WORLD

Mexican scientist Salamander dies. It soon emerges that he was planning to take over the United Zones and become a world dictator. It is also revealed that he was responsible for a number of recent 'natural' disasters. [An official attempt is made to reassure the public that there is no danger of weather control technology being misused in this way again.]

There is apparently an onscreen date, as we see a newspaper from the year before. Unfortunately, this scene no longer exists, so we don't know what it is. Two dates have been suggested. 2017 comes from a contemporary Radio Times article, which set it fifty years in the future. 2030 comes from the storyline for the novelisation and its back-cover blurb, being fifty years after its intended publication date. The text, however, is silent on the matter. In the absence of any actual evidence, I'm choosing the earlier date - which seems the most likely date for the newspaper clipping.

2018

The Doctor placed a personal ad saying Ace - Behind You! in an issue of NME from this year. Ace later bought a copy from Ladbroke Grove hypertube station.

According to Timewyrm: Revelation pages 95-96 & 216.

2019

The microprocessor becomes redundant, replaced by a system called Single Molecule Transcription.

According to the computers on Station 5 in The Long Game.

c. 2020

The Silurians entombed at Wenley Moor awaken.

They go back into 'deep freeze' for fifty years at the end of The Silurians.

Tegan Jovanka leaves the Shawlands mental institution.

It seems to be shortly before she met William in More Short Trips: Good Companions.

c. 2023

Tegan Jovanka marries Dr William Haybourne.

Ten years before More Short Trips: Good Companions.

2024

Humans develop their first plasma rifle.

First Frontier.

2030

The Doctor, Ace, and Benny pick up a message at UNIT HQ left by Cristián Alvarez 37 years before.

The Left Handed Hummingbird.

c. 2030

There is a [brief] war involving Norway. Tower Hamlets is one of several bits of London lost in this war.

Decalog 4: Second Chances (page 12). This is an approximate date, which allows Jack and Billy Forrester's grandfather to have lived in Nelson Mandela house before this war.

By this stage, technology had again advanced. There were devices enabling cars to do most of the work of driving. Computers routinely understood verbal commands. Microchips in the back of the neck were available as an alternative to the traditional passport. 3-D TV was widespread. Alzheimer's Disease was now curable. In addition, smoking had dramatically decreased [in the west] thanks to effective public health campaigns [together with deaths of smokers]. Passenger Airliners were still in use, despite having been superseded (in some cases) by rockets.

This is the technical background to Warchild. The rockets are from The Enemy of the World.

In addition to this, the British railways had been renationalised and people complained about what had happened to them. Boy racers were allowed easier access to motorways.

This is mentioned in More Short Trips: Good Companions.

2031

August

WARCHILD

London declares a state of emergency as dog packs under the control of a dog known as the "White King" have been attacking people. Reports of the emergency are restricted.

Justine was in the early stages of pregnancy with Ricky in Warlock and Ricky is now fifteen. It is August.

2033

MORE SHORT TRIPS: GOOD COMPANIONS

Tegan meets a future incarnation of the Doctor.

Tegan is 73. It is half a century since she last saw Aunt Vanessa.

c. 2033

Humanity develops T-Mat, a system of instantaneous travel. Over the next decade, T-Mat makes conventional space travel obsolete. Before this, there had been regular passenger modules travelling between Earth and the Moon.

T-Mat has been around for years and has been around long enough to make advocates of rocket travel look eccentric. Thus, it's probably been around for about a decade.

[The Ice Warriors had been observing events on Earth. They believed that T-Mat and weather control would allow humanity to terraform Mars. As Mars was limited in resources, they believed that to prevent this possibility, they would have to act now. They began drawing up plans for pre-emptive strikes on Earth.]

This is speculation based on The Seeds of Death and the Thousand-Day War mentioned in Transit.

2034

Professor Philip Yarrow is appointed Head of Technical Sciences at Manchester University.

According to Heritage page 127.

2037

During the Wars of Independence, the city of Phoenix, Arizona, is destroyed and turned into a dustbowl. This is later blamed on a Tesla bomb planted by breakaway Southern states. The survivors and their descendants would live in trailer parks near the city for decades after its destruction.

This was in '37 according to page 67 of Alien Bodies, which tells the story from the point of view of someone in 2069.

On Earth, [small] groups [of extremists] such as the Pull Back To Earth movement opposed the new interest in space travel. They began a [limited] terrorist campaign against colonising other worlds. [Amongst scientists, a new religion called] the Earth School Of Parapsychology was founded. Based in an area known as The City, it schooled children in logic and memory. [Amongst the school's beliefs was a rejection of all non-essential history.] Another group of humans developed psychotropic drugs to prevent mind control. Astronauts were fitted with Silenski capsules to detect outside influences. Meanwhile, jet helicopters had become the principal form of transport on Earth.

This is the background to The Wheel in Space. Helicopters are mentioned in The Wheel in Space, and by Zoe in The Invasion. In Just War, Benny claims that they were the principal form of transport at the time.

c. 2037

THE WHEEL IN SPACE

A group of Cybermen captured a Phoenix IV rocket and used it to infiltrate the space station W5. They intended to use it as a radio beacon for their nearby fleet. Their attack was repulsed, despite the mental instability of the base's commander Jarvis Bennett.

In The Invasion, the Brigadier says that Zoe was born in the 21st Century and is 19 or so (thus we have a date of 2020-2120). In The Mind Robber, she recognises the Karkus, a comic strip character from 2000. However, this story is definitely not set then, as she needs to confirm that the Doctor has been there. Presumably, she's seen reprints or the year 2000 is the setting or the year the strip began, rather than the year of publication. T-Mat (The Seeds of Death) has been invented by Short Trips: Companions: The Tip of the Mind - a few years after Zoe's time. The Wheel's advance weather-reporting function could indicate either that this is before the Gravitron (The Moonbase, or that the Gravitron needs advance information to compensate for solar flares. On the other hand, Short Trips and Side Steps: Shut the Gate suggests that humans have colonised Mars by this point - making it after the 1000-day War. This would make Zoe's ignorance of the Martians in The Seeds of Death practically impossible.

The Cybermen look more like The Invasion Cybermen than the Moonbase Cybermen do. Thus, it is probably before The Moonbase. Jean-Marc L'officier's Program Guide, Terrestrial Index and Universal Databank give the dates 1999-2000, c. 2020 and 2030 respectively. DWM has suggested 2074. David Banks' Cybermen went for 2028. Lance Parkin's A History of the Universe went for 2068. Other chronologies I've come across have suggested 2120 (30 years after its date for The Seeds of Death) and 2098 (no reason given). A date between 2050 and 2070 would work well, however I've chosen to put this in the 2030s to fit in with the Cyber-Incursions of the 2030s mentioned several times in Alien Bodies.

After this, there were several more Cyberman attacks on the population of Earth. These attacks were repelled by UNISYC and were public knowledge. Most of those UNISYC personnel who left the organisation after this ended up either leading religious cults in LA or seeing aliens everywhere.

According to Alien Bodies. The ex-UNISYC details are from page 40, the rest is patching together the picture given from the rest of the book.

Zoe Heriot plays a role in the tidy-up aboard W3. Records of these events are only available for those with security clearance alpha. At some point, she completes a piece on nova star predominance.

According to Short Trips: Companions: The Tip of the Mind pages 7-8. It is unclear whether the piece on nova star predominance was before her time with the Doctor, between that and joining the UrtiCorp Project, or during her early days on the project. It is only dated as "some years back."

The UrtiCorp Project begins. For the next six years, it will have flat funding, a flat headcount, and zero attrition for at least the next six years.

Six years before Short Trips: Companions: The Tip of the Mind.

2038

The World Zones Accord is signed by Whiteacre. It makes the UN into a joke.

According to page 68 of Alien Bodies.

c. 2040

The Second Doctor [together with Ben and Polly] visited the Draconian Empire, curing a great plague. The 15th Emperor proclaimed him a noble of the Draconian Empire. He was the first being of his skin tone that the Draconians had ever seen, and an accurate portrait of him was painted. It was probably then that he became known as Karshtakavaar, the oncoming storm.

The visit was mentioned in Frontier in Space, when it is supposed to have been about 500 years beforehand. The painting and skin tone are mentioned in The Dark Path, where the events are said to be 1000 years before. The name Karshtakavaar is first mentioned in Love and War. It is referred to on several subsequent occasions.

c. 2040

Zoe Heriot joins the UrtiCorp Project. During that same year, the project acquires a polyphase analyser.

Three Years before Short Trips: Companions: The Tip of the Mind page 8.

2041

Womanuscripts: 21st Century Female Fiction is published. It includes the story of Tegan's encounter with a future Doctor and his companion Anna.

More Short Trips: Good Companions.

2040s

Events in Haiti occur that will lead to Voodoo being banned in most places on Earth.

According to page 124 of Alien Bodies.

2042

Kathleen Bregman is born.

She is 27 by page 8 of Alien Bodies.

c. 2043

SHORT TRIPS: COMPANIONS: TIP OF THE MIND

Doctor John Smith visits the Urticorp Project on XZ49.

Zoe has been on the project for three years (page 8), though it's unclear how long elapsed between her being returned to her own time following The Wheel in Space and her joining this project. Director Sheerstock's comments about Zoe's recent history suggests that some time has elapsed.

THE SEEDS OF DEATH

Ice Warriors attack a vital T-Mat relay centre on the Moon. They then prepare to use Martian SeedPods to "Mars-form" the Earth. They are defeated when artificial rain destroys the pods and a solar energy weapon is used to destroy the Martian force on the Moon. Eventually, the Martian Invasion Fleet is lured into the Sun.

This story is very difficult to date. According to the Doctor, Eldred's rocket is a product of the 21st century. As it's only a prototype at this stage, we have a date in the range 2000-2099. Eldred's age and the fact that his father developed a lunar passenger module put it at least two generations after space travel. T-Mat has been around for years, possibly in the region of a decade. The Weather Control Bureau sets it after 2016 (when Salamander developed weather control). The bureau is on Earth - so it's before 2050, when the graviton is invented, or after 2070 if the graviton then became obsolete. Man has not travelled beyond Earth. [They obviously don't count brief trips such as the Mars Probes from The Ambassadors of Death and The Dying Days or to Jupiter in The Android Invasion.

It has to be before the Thousand Day War (2086) mentioned in Transit, as the Ice Warriors leave Mars at the end of the war. T-Mat has been invented by Short Trips Companions: The Tip of the Mind, so it cannot be too long after The Wheel in Space. It can't be between 2068 & 2096, because Galactic Salvage and Insurance (Nightmare of Eden) are operating then and this would be impossible if T-Mat replaced space travel. As 4 years seems too short a time for ion rockets to explore the solar system, as stated in The Mutants, it cannot be after then. Lucifer Rising places this story about 2090. The bulk of evidence seems to suggest 2016-2050. T-Mat isn't mentioned in Warchild (c.2030), suggesting that it was after that date. Thus, we should probably place this story sometime in the 2040s. The exact date is arbitrary.

[Immediately afterwards, the Martian Grand Marshall contacted humanity to claim that Slaar's forces had been acting outside of his control. The World Zones Authority accepted this statement gladly, knowing that there was no way they could wage war on Mars at that time, because they had very few spacecraft capable of reaching Mars and T-Mat required ready-constructed receiving equipment.]

Following these events, there was a huge public reaction against T-Mat. Its huge cost ruled out conventional space travel. It had been very publicly demonstrated that T-Mat was vulnerable to outside attack. Whilst there were still large numbers of T-Mat enthusiasts. Earth Government abandoned T-Mat as a travel system.

This is an attempt to tie up the loose ends of The Seeds of Death. It explains why there is not an immediate war between Earth and Mars, and why we don't see T-Mat in other 21st century stories.

Newly revitalised, space travellers took on the plans hatched during the clean up earlier in the century. International Space Control was [re-established] in Geneva. Rockets now only took a couple of hours to travel between Earth and the Moon. Ion Jet Rockets [began extensive] exploration of the Solar System.

This is the background to The Moonbase

POWER OF THE DALEKS

The human colony on Vulcan discovers a 200 year-old crashed spaceship, which turns out to be full of Daleks. The Dalek attempt to take over the colony is thwarted by a mysterious visitor.

There is no on-screen date. Two dates have become associated with this story. The date 2020 was used in contemporary publicity. This date, however, seems far too early for a human colony, even if (as some propose) Vulcan were in the solar system. The Terrestrial Index has a complicated way of suggesting the year is 2220, but that the colony calendar said 2020. War of the Daleks implies that these Daleks arrived from the far future, which is why they recognise the second Doctor. The Murder Game claims that Vulcan is practically a legend. Whatever the time, the colonists don't recognise the Daleks and do have contact with Earth - so it's before 2157. If it weren't for The Murder Game, I'd place it just before the invasion, but as it is, it has to be 21^st century, possibly in the middle of the century, and the colony disappeared at some point (soon) after this.

2044

Wanlek Ackman's book The Absurdity of Performance is published.

We see an extract on page 246 of Theatre of War.

2045

Professor Ottobrand of the Dubrovnik Institute of New Sciences hypothesises Psychotronic conditioning. It combines mesmeric trance techniques with aggressive implantation of images and related experiences.

According to K9 in The Well Mannered War Chapter 8, page 16.

2046

The Doctor visits the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

This was 50 years after Decalog 3: UNITed we Fall (1996), according to page 132.

2049

Borneo is turned into the East Indies ReVit Zone. by a local government with an obsessive environmental streak.

This was twenty years before page 9 of Alien Bodies.

July 2049

Issue 428 of Theatre Today contains an article by Haga Nodena entitled The Techniques of the Actor.

We see an extract on page 197 of Theatre of War

2050

The Gravitron is built on the moon by the Butler Institute. It may have been based on Silurian technology.

The Moonbase and Deceit. The Silurians have a Gravitron in Blood Heat, though they must have originally developed the technology without taking the moon's effects into account.

c. 2050

Domesticated wolves are re-introduced into various Northern European forests [as part of the big clean up]. There are rumours that the Wicca Society has released wild wolves, leading to widespread debate about which strain would become dominant.

According to Transit page 134, this was 'the middle of the last century' - so somewhere around 2050.

c. 2050

An ill-fated attempt was made to amalgamate the world's religions [by the liberal wings of these religions]. It soon collapsed [due to the obvious fact that they all contradict each other. This amalgamation attempt was completely ignored by the vast majority of followers of most of the religions involved, who continued to believe their faith was the only way to heaven, or the equivalent concept.] The chapter of St. Anthony was [one of a number of cults] formed to fill the void left among adherents of this new, weak, religion. When Hong Kong took over China, the Yong family joined the chapter in a new crusade to purge the heathens.

St. Anthony's Fire. I have attempted to explain how such a nonsensical idea as trying to merge world religions could have possibly been proposed. I can't see how Hong Kong (a single city) could ever be in a position to take over China (a massive country).

c. 2053

Sandra Urtiman gets third prize, and is highly commended at the Drazah Institute.

A decade before Short Trips: Companions: The Tip of the Mind page 8.

2054

The Montana Republican Militia use thermosystronic weapons to attempt to take over Canada. UNISYC forces including Tchike and Kortez attempt to capture the thermosystron bombs under orders from the innermost circles of the World Zones Authority, but the Doctor intervenes and blows them all up. In the year after this, Sergeant Kortez will spend a year in India on a spiritual discovery mission. He will turn to Zen Buddhism in order to cope with his encounter with Selachians.

As mentioned and dated in Alien Bodies, pages 7-8 and 12-13. However it is implied that this was only nine years before the bulk of the book on page 17.

The Hourly Telepress smuggles out footage of the Toy Store, a secret American base which holds captured extraterrestrial artefacts.

Dated as '54 by Brigadier Renault on page 71 of Alien Bodies.

2050s

Human scientists develop "Summerset's leopard",a genetically enhanced panther. They will be used as guard dogs by the very rich and become quite a status symbol in Japan.

This is dated to the 2050s on page 39 of Alien Bodies.

2056

Professor Philip Yarrow ceases to be Head of Technical Sciences at Manchester University.

According to Heritage page 127. The reason is not given.

By this time, computer technology had advanced significantly. It was now possible, though expensive, to implant neuralware into a human brain and enable humans to link into a datanet without a physical connection. [This did, however, cause certain problems. The connection involved receivers at the computer end that had a limited range. It also made computer security much more difficult to maintain. There were also concerns raised about the long-term health impact of the technology.] The technology was used primarily for physical interfaces, such as external repairs to space stations and guiding advanced missiles.

Decalog 4: Second Chances. I have suggested some reasons why this kind of computer interface never became widespread enough to appear in other, later, stories.

2059

The Mandela leaves Earth with 100,000 African colonists in suspended animation.

Decalog 4: Heritage (page 105).

2060

Kathlen Bregman joins UNISYC.

She has been in UNISYC for nine of her 27 years by page 8. Over the next nine years, she will only see an alien in UNISYC's Big Green Museum.

2064

General Tchike erases all records of the Doctor from UN files. Within five years, nobody below the rank of Brigadier woill even know that the Doctor exists.

He says that this was five years ago (from 2069) on page 74 of Alien Bodies.

c. 2065

DECALOG 4: SECOND CHANCES

Jack Forrester is killed by a Neural Stunner on Pellucidar Station in the L4 cluster. Soon afterwards, a maintenance drone goes missing.

The Mandela colony ship left in 2059 (Decalog 4: Heritage - page 105), which was only a few years previously. On the other hand, there are standing orders about how to treat spontaneously generated AIs. This would appear to place it after FLORANCE went public in Transit (2109), but they were probably drafted in response to WOTAN, BOSS, and possibly some other similar systems. Jack's grandfather lived in Nelson Mandela House - Tower Hamlets.

August 2067

SHORT TRIPS: STOP THE PIGEON

Howard Chithros claims to turn back the hands of time. He produces babies genetically identical to several disappeared Octogenarians. The collapse of his scheme causes a national scandal.

The date is given on page 84. This story is difficult to reconcile with the Master's account of what happened to him after Survival in First Frontier.

2068

Galactic Salvage and Insurance is set up in London [in response to a growing market for space travel].

Nightmare of Eden.

When the great human expansion into space happened, a traveller called Fox stole a ship in dock for repairs and took it as far into hyperspace as he could. He and his people landed on Arcturus 6 and busked for their supper before official first contact between the two races. The travellers continued moving through space, living at the frontiers of human space.

Love and War page 39. This has to be before the Arcturan Treaty of 2085 mentioned in The Dying Days.

26th March 2069

The relic crashes into Earth's atmosphere near the Phoenix Sandbowl. The next day, Colonel Kortez uses an MI7 microcamera to take pictures of government security agents at the crash site. The pictures it takes will end up in the hands of UNISYC at some point in the following month.

This is dated on pages 68-69

April 2069

ALIEN BODIES: UNISYC'S STORY

A UNISYC Conclave examines Colonel Kortez's pictures from the crash site, having received an invitation that hints at what the relic is.

This is dated on page 68.

2069

ALIEN BODIES

General Tchike and the Doctor play chess. During the match, Tchike tries to assassinate the Doctor but he escapes. At the same time, Mr Qixotl holds an auction on Earth, with the prize of the Relic - supposedly the Doctor's body. Bidders include UNISYC, the Time Lords, Faction Paradox, the Celestis, and the enemy. The arrival of what was supposed to be the Daleks' ship sends shockwaves through the psychic aura of the eastern hemisphere, causing those in India and Malaysia to see disturbing patterns in the static of their TV sets, forcing images of impossible machines into the minds of research scientists, and New Agers to experience visions of crystal planets which they would put down to something in the water. The auction site is subsequently attacked by Kroton spaceships travelling through a time corridor, before they disappear. At the end of the auction, the Unthinkable City, in which the auction has taken place, briefly appears to the inhabitants of the East Indies ReVit Zone, which subsequently has an infestation of Leopards.

The main story is not dated, but it is almost certainly in the same year as the UNISYC segment.

c. 2069

The Hotel Galaxian is built to be the first tourist attraction in space. It is vaguely spherical in shape, and the shuttle fee is relatively modest. It receives international commendations for its design and engineering, and awards from the corporate sector. It is a popular venue for international business meetings.

According to The Murder Game pages 9-10. Its early years are said to have been when interstellar travel was expensive and there was nowhere much to go. I place its construction a bit earlier than that era.

25th December 2069

SHORT TRIPS COMPANIONS: THE LITTLE DRUMMER BOY

The TARDIS briefly lands in a small Sussex village on Christmas day.

This is dated on page 154.

2070

About this time, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York was torn down.

Nearly 75 years after Decalog 3:UNITed we fall (1996).

16th July 2070

The Doctor and General Tchike have an appointment to play chess on this date.

According to Tchike on page 19 of Alien Bodies this is "next year".

The Sontarans ventured onto Earth's side of the Coal Sack at about this time.

According to Karne, the last time this happened was three hundred years before Lords of the Storm (2371).

THE MOONBASE

The moonbase containing the Gravitron was hit by a space plague. It was placed in quarantine shortly before the Cybermen attacked. This time, they planned to use the Gravitron to facilitate their conquest of Earth. They were, once again, repulsed.

The date is stated onscreen. In The Murder Game, Terri claims that everyone knows about the Cybermen from this adventure, but that no-one's heard of the 1986 invasion, which was presumably dropped from history lessons at some point.

This incident caused widespread damage on Earth, mostly through earthquakes, hurricanes, and tidal waves. [One consequence of this activity] was the creation of an island in the mid-Atlantic, created by seismic shifts. This became the New Dutch Republic.

The New Dutch Republic is mentioned in St. Anthony's Fire. Lance Parkin was the first to link these two events in his History. I reckon that the connection is too obvious to be right, but I've mentioned it anyway.

Realising that the conquest of Earth was no longer a possibility, the remaining CyberFaction Cybermen left the solar system. They eventually conquered Telos and constructed vast CyberTombs in which to preserve themselves. It was widely assumed that the Cybermen had died out. The exact reason for constructing these tombs is unknown. Perhaps these Cybermen sent out groups to contact the CyberNomads, leaving a remnant in the tombs to avoid extinction. Perhaps they believed that the tombs were their only hope of survival. Perhaps it was all an elaborate trap to convert those with an interest in the CyberRace. Whatever the reason, the Cybermen remained hidden for hundreds of years.

Tomb of the Cybermen.

c. 2073

A decade after Doctor John Smith's visit to the UrtiCorp Project, Dr Sandra Urtiman is still obsessed with what happened during that visit.

According to Short Trips: Companions: The Tip of the Mind page 12, this is the case for more than a decade after the story.

On Earth, the political situation worsened. [The World Zones Authority began to have problems with resource distribution, causing some zones to take matters into their own hands. As the situation continued, old rivalries re-emerged.] This situation led to a stand-off between two powerful blocs: the East and the West. To make the situation even more volatile, the invention of mentally controlled Proton Missiles had made a nuclear war winnable. [The situation was further destablised by the activities of Pull Back To Earth and the first human colonisation in the solar system.] One military innovation that was to prove important in the course of this new cold war was the Seabase. Sat on ocean floors, they kept Proton Missiles safe and primed. The most interesting feature of these bases was the lighting. [In order to distract the crews from their isolation], the bases were lit almost as brightly as if it were daylight. Above these bases were Hunter-Killer naval units and roboticised Sentinel Satellite systems, which protected certain areas of inner space. Genetic manipulation and intelligent loyalty chips were used to produce better soldiers, and energy weapons were introduced.

This is the background to Warriors of the Deep. Genetic manipulation and loyalty chips appear to have been in use during the thousand-day war (2086-2088), judging from Transit. The two blocs were only named in the novelisation.

Late 21st Century

At this point, the Daleks are mostly scattered around the edge of Mutters' Spiral trying to build up a decent galactic powerbase. Meanwhile, those left behind on Skaro are starting to think about putting together their own little empire. This era was the "static electricity" phase of Dalek development.

According to the Doctor on page 138 of Alien Bodies.

2076

Humans find a cure for Ebola.

According to the Doctor on page 32 of Only Human.

c. 2080

Human knowledge of genetic manipulation reaches the stage at which it is possible to fuse a human and an animal.

The Doctor says that this won't be possible on Earth for 200 years in Evolution (page 148) On the other hand, Professor Zaroff manages something similar around 1970. [He does this by operations rather than genetic fusion].

c. 2084

WARRIORS OF THE DEEP

A group of Earth Reptiles attacked Seabase 4. They were under the authority of Icthar, the last survivor of a ruling triumvirate; and intended to use the base's proton missiles to wipe out humanity and reclaim their world. They used a Myrka to stage a diversion, whilst an elite group of Sea Devils attacked. Faced with total defeat, the humans released Hexachromite Gas, fatal to reptiles, but harmless to humans.

The Doctor estimates that they have landed in about 2084.

2085

The Arcturan Treaty is signed. It is the first official peaceful contact between humanity and an alien race.

According to The Dying Days chapter 7.

2086-2088

Meanwhile, humanity had spread throughout the Solar System with the aid of ion rockets. Mining operations had been established on moons and asteroids throughout the solar system and some people were beginning to think about colonising other worlds. On Mars, the Ice Warriors were very concerned about these developments and decided to send humanity a very big message. An asteroid later dubbed The Paris Rock destroyed the Earth City of Paris. Although intended as a warning to keep away from Mars, humanity took it as a declaration of war.

Humanity's first action was to establish a beachhead on Mars. The United Nations Third Tactical Response Brigade under Brigadier Yembe Lethbridge-Stewart, aka the Blue Berets, and the Zen Brigade were first in. These Irish and Ethiopians captured Olympus Mons with severe casualties. They then set up an interstitial tunnel, a version of T-mat, to supply huge numbers of reinforcements. The war lasted exactly a thousand days. As the war wore on, soldiers were genetically modified. They were augmented to interface more closely with their armour, and began using weapons long banned on Earth. In the end, the millions of human soldiers [apparently] drove the Martians to the brink of extinction. The Martians, however, were not destroyed. A substantial proportion of their population escaped to another solar system, probably near Arcturus. A small number remained in hiding on Mars. Victory - achieved on Constitution Day - was celebrated by planting of a forest in the Achebe Gorge on Mars, with a tree for each of the 450,000 soldiers who died in combat.

This is background to Transit, details being mentioned throughout the book. The Martian relocation is mentioned in Legacy, though the location of their new solar system is unstated. In The Curse of Peladon, they are old enemies of Arcturus, so they probably relocated to that area. The Martians remaining on Mars are alluded to at the end of Transit and seen in Godengine. The war has been over for at least 25 years before Transit and is dated 2086-2088 in Virgin's Future History Continuity document. The Dying Days dates the war as ninety years from 1997 (chapter 5 page 9), and provides a few more details.

At some point in the war, the Angel Francine is shot down and rescued by Brigadier Yembe Lethbridge-Stewart.

According to Transit pages 38-39.

A Honda Pullman train exits the Beverley Hills-Hawaii commuter line carrying 49 passengers a fraction of a second before a General Electric Go-Faster Caboose carrying 30 passengers does. The gateway compensator prevents Los Angeles from being destroyed, but all aboard both trains die horrifically.

Just after the war, according to Transit page 83.

The Stop, a settlement on Pluto, is planned at the same time as Dogface begins customising the engine known as Fat Mama. Meanwhile, Mitsubishi is built on Triton, a moon of Neptune. It begins a series of civil rights legislation, but still remains the most segregated city in the solar system.

All of these are said to have happened 30 years before Transit on pages 63, 74, and 89 respectively. I have placed them just after the war rather than in the middle as the 30 year figure would be.

The Angel Francine undertakes a brief period of data piracy and Brigadier Yembe Lethbridge-Stewart retires to the West African forest, stops taking his medication, and waits to die.

According to Transit pages 107-108 and pages 123-124. This appears to have been just after the war.

In the years after the war, human society changed dramatically. Colonisation of the entire Solar System was finally possible. Flowers had already been cultivated on Venus. Bases had been established on most of the solid planets and moons, as well as several of the larger asteroids. World Government, having had a president since well before the war, evolved into The Union of Solar Republics. This democratic government invested heavily in the Sol Transit System (STS), [apparently oblivious to the reasons for the collapse of T-mat]. This established a system of quick travel between the various inhabited worlds and continents.

The first decade after the war saw many changes in parallel with the development of STS. Paris was rebuilt, and a new settlement was built on Pluto. Named Lowell Depot, it was designed to house an expected population overspill.

The most important change, however, was a revolution in certain areas of business. [New technologies allowed] new companies from Brazil, China, and Africa such as Imbani Entertainment, Mtchali, and Tung-Po to seize almost the entire market share of companies such as IBM, Sony, and Matsui. These long-established companies went under, despite their best efforts to adapt to the new economy. [The collapse of so many Japanese multi-nationals] caused the Japanese economy to collapse, and the supply of money to the Martian Terraforming Program dried up. Meanwhile, Australia starved [due partly to a huge population boom, partly to desertification, but mostly to poverty brought on by the Japanese collapse]. Power shifted to centres such as Washington, Brasilia, Harare, Beijing, Tehran, Jacksonville, and Zagreb.

Unlike the Great Depression of the 1930's, the Recession was not worldwide. Caused as it was by the emergence of powerful companies from previously impoverished nations, it created a lot of money in those nations. [Although this might have been mostly owned by the existing elites.] Europe was brought into relative poverty, but remained comfortable. Absolute poverty became the norm in Australia and Lowell Depot, now known as The Stop.

In these poor areas, street gangs rapidly grew up. Vickers All-Body Combat Systems were equipped with the Melbourne Protocols to prevent harm to civilians. Millions fled riots through STS, and were rehoused on Mars. Security firms such as V Soc and the KGB took maximum advantage from this. In addition to this, some people practised communal marriages.

This is the background to Transit.

[At some point during this century,] humanity finally discovered faster than light travel. This enabled the colonisation of several other solar systems. [These earliest ships were expensive and unreliable. Therefore,] the main thrust of exploration to the stars during this century was the Lagship. Suspended animation technology was well developed by now, and many such ships were sent out.

On the new colonies, the founding fathers were often revered by subsequent generations. Many these colonies were under the stranglehold of corporations.

The warp drive was discovered by 2116 (The Nightmare of Eden) and production line warpships were in production by 2112 - presumably custom built ones existed earlier. Other details are a summary of information related in several television and novelised stories. Despite this, The Romance of Crime places "the first great breakout" in the early 23rd century. We can, therefore, conclude that colonisation during this period was fairly limited.

2090

A new world called Varos was established to house the criminally insane. The colony had, however, been used for mining some time before this.

Varos has been "stable for more than two centuries" before Vengeance on Varos (2295). It has also been a mining colony for "centuries" before that story.

c. 2091

The Meson System was colonised.

According to the Doctor, they've come a long way in a hundred years on Time of Your Life page 27 (2191).

2092

The regulators on the Central Line of the Transit system are installed.

According to Dogface in Transit (page 6) this was 25 years ago.

A computer called JERUSALEM is built in case the Martians have left 'stay behind' units in cryogenic storage.

This was in the aftermath of the war. Jerusalem has been dormant for 25 years before Transit page 188 (set c.2117). So it was built by 2092.

2096

Galactic Salvage and Insurance went bust [due to the rise of the transit system].

The Nightmare of Eden.

Acting on a request from the Angel Francine, Brigadier Yembe Lethbridge-Stewart broke into IMOGEN's Ubersoldaten project, intending to destroy all of the 'second-generation' genetically engineered superwarriors. However, he couldn't bring himself to kill the first of these - a three-month old girl - and so took her home, naming her Kadiatu. He destroyed all the equipment and records used by the project. Francine then bought out the company, ensuring that the project would never be restarted.

According to Transit. This was 'eight years later' than Francine's data stealing career (page 108). It is 21 years before Transit (page 111).

2097

Credit Card joins the Transit system's staff.

He's spent twenty years making himself indispensable according to Ming on Transit page 99.

c. 2100

The ship New Hope leaves to colonise the planet Agora.

Killing Ground.

Lord Grayvorn escapes from his imprisonment as a psychic recording in the stones of the Excelis Library, and begins trying to push the history of Excelis in the direction he wants it to go.

In Excelis Decays, Grayvorn/Sutton mentions that the inner party has had 200 years to build society to where it is. The Doctor's opinion that the Excelis State was founded about 150 years ago suggests that this date was when Grayvorn escaped from his imprisonment.

You visited the Whoniverse at 1:59 am GMT on Wednesday 29th November 2006