'The Adventures Before'

Discover what happened before . . .

What did Osgood do the morning of the Day of the Doctor?

What happened to Tegan before Arc of Infinity, and why does it involve strange sentient lights in the Australia outback?

What was the Tenth Doctor doing in a hall of mirrors, right before Planet of the Dead?

Answers to all these questions lie in an incredible collection of new Doctor Who short stories that give a glimpse into the moments just before we saw the Doctor step on screen.

From Skaro to Apalapucia, from a shop front drained of colour to Rassilon’s tomb, join a host of incredible adventures across the universe with Doctors, companions, friends and foes.

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'The Boy and the Dalek' by Mark Griffiths

Responding to a distress call, the Doctor, Jamie and Victoria find a lone Dalek aboard an otherwise deserted Earth space ship. The Dalek uses a telepresence machine to share its memories: on Skaro, scientist Dalek 444 created a phi wave weapon to kill a giant Soil Serpent that was attacking the city. Although damaged in the battle, 444 was shown mercy by the Emperor Dalek, and put to work tending the flowers that were used to create the weapon. Puzzled by a trap set for the pests that ate the plants, 444 caught a boy named Harrison, the sole survivor of a crashed Earth ship. The two struck up a highly unlikely friendship, and when the Daleks later seized Harrison’s ship, 444 decided to steal it and return the boy to Earth. But just as the duo were about to reach the ship, they were intercepted by the Emperor Dalek, who injured Harrison and gave the order for 444 to be exterminated. However, 444 sacrificed itself to save Harrison, putting the boy inside its travel machine so he could reach his space ship and escape. In the present, the Doctor and his friends are surprised when the Dalek’s casing opens to reveal Harrison; using the TARDIS, they take him back to his grandparents on Earth. Back on Skaro, 444 drags itself into the petrified forest outside the Dalek city, and dies just after a group of strangers arrive in a mysterious blue box...

Notes:
*Featuring the Second Doctor, Jamie and Victoria, with the First Doctor, Susan, Ian and Barbara

*This story is a prequel to 'The Mutants', a.k.a. 'The Daleks'

*Time-placing: The Doctor says he hasn’t visited Skaro for “many years”, which is odd, as he, Jamie and Victoria were there in ‘The Evil of the Daleks’. I’m therefore placing this at the end of their adventures together, just prior to ‘Fury From the Deep’

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'The Roots of Evil' by Steve Cole

Mercenary Scorby teams up with disgraced UNIT soldier Latz on a job for horticultural collector Harrison Chase. Posing as contractors, and with the aid of a stolen Ogron gun, they infiltrate UNIT’s ‘Junkyard’ facility and steal an alien plant know as an Eloko. While Scorby also helps himself to alien weaponry and technology stored at the site, Latz moves the Eloko into their van, pricking his hand on the plant in the process… Back at Chase’s mansion, the two thieves receive their payment for the heist. Seeing Latz’s wound, Chase insists he stay at the house for treatment. However Latz’s blood has infected the Eloko, which takes on his form and then reproduces itself, creating twisted plant-forms taken from Latz’s memories. Latz manages to manhandle the plant into his van; but in his attempt to drive away, Latz is confused by the Eloko’s mental roots in his mind, and he drives the vehicle into a wall, killing himself and the plant in the ensuing explosion.

Notes:
*This story is a prequel to 'The Seeds of Doom'

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'Little Did She Know' by Janet Fielding

After being fired from her airline job, Tegan travels to Brisbane to visit her family on their sugarcane farm. Although she receives a friendly welcome from her brother Luke, Tegan’s father is angry at her over his sister Vanessa’s death. Strange things happen to Tegan: she sees several snakes, reminding her of the Mara, and she sees strange lights in the sugarcane field. The lights reappear the next night, setting fire to the sugarcane crop and striking down Tegan’s father; as Tegan tries to revive him with CPR, she is menaced by a venomous snake, and hears the voice of the Mara in her head. Luke distracts the creature, getting bitten in the process, enabling Tegan to save her father’s life. Both men are rushed to hospital, where they make their recoveries. Tegan’s father is convinced that the lights were an alien parent retrieving errant children straying where they shouldn’t; changed by the experience, he comforts Tegan over her guilt at her aunt’s death. Her relationship with her father repaired, Tegan sets off on her next adventure, paying a visit to her cousin in Amsterdam...

Notes:
*Featuring Tegan

*This story is a prequel to 'Arc of Infinity'

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'The Four Faces of Immortality' by Gary Russell

Having lost the Game of Rassilion, Borusa awakes to find himself in a strange limbo with three other former Presidents, who were also victims of their own lust for power: Pandad, Jarel and Muul. After hearing the stories of how they too came to be imprisoned for eternity, Borusa discovers there are many more victims still to join them...

Notes:
*This story is billed as a prequel to 'The Five Doctors', although it takes place after the events of the story, making it a coda

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'Becky's Impossible Day' by Beth Axford

While tidying her nail salon, Becky is attacked by a bizarre creature, which drains the colour out of its surroundings, turning everything grey as it feeds. Becky is saved by a man in a black jacket, who encourages her to think sad thoughts to repel the creature. When the monster turns on the man instead, Becky turns his own torch device on him, sending his dark thoughts into the creature; this gives the monster food poisoning, and it vomits the stolen colours back into the objects they came from. After telling Becky that he will to return to continue his investigations into reports of moving mannequins, the man takes the creature, an alien Ashen, away in a strange blue box. Left to process her life-altering experience, Becky cleans up the mess in her salon...

Notes:
*Featuring the Ninth Doctor

*This story is a prequel to, and leads into, 'Rose'

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'Smiley's Mirror Exhibit' by Janelle McCurdy

Returning to Earth, the Doctor checks out a museum installation of mirrors arranged in the shape of a giant smiley face. Sneaking into an off-limits section of the museum that houses a room full of mirrors, Doctor meets a young girl, who is investigating the exhibit’s link to disappearances of children, including her friend Jake. Suspecting a monster is hiding in the mirrors, the Doctor creates a crystalised spyglass to detect it. The Doctor identifies the creature as a Smiley, an alien shapeshifter that bases its appearance of an amalgamation of its kidnapped victims. The girl manages to take a polaroid picture of the monster, but then she too is kidnapped and imprisoned in a void with the other missing children. Knowing how the creature hates its own image, the Doctor uses the museum’s planetarium to project the photo to giant size; as the creature vanishes with a scream, the mirror room shatters, and its victims are released. The Doctor leaves in the TARDIS, and the girl, Nova Starr, is reunited with Jake and her mother. Outside the museum, Lady Christina de Souza plans a heist…

Notes:
*Featuring the Tenth Doctor, with Lady Christina de Souza

*This story is a prequel to 'Planet of the Dead'

*Time-placing: For the Doctor, this story takes place immediately after ‘The Next Doctor’; for Lady Christina de Souza, just before 'Planet of the Dead'

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'The Fall of Apalapucia' by E.L. Norry

The paradise planet of Apalapucia offers its visitors the Sublimation process, in which their telepaths remove negative thoughts from patrons’ minds and use them to create works of art. These beautiful artworks are displayed in a Timestream Gallery, where the rate of time is slowed to prevent the fragile works from decaying. Ambassador Seladore is one such telepath, but his age has caused his art to be less than perfect. Nearing retirement, Seladore reads the mind of a visiting Quarsoon child, creating a beautiful tree from its thoughts. But the child is a trap: his mind conceals a Xumaan, one of an ancient race of destroyers, and the tree transforms into a deadly mist that kills every Apalapucian on the planet.

Notes:
*This story is a prequel to 'The Girl Who Waited'

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'The Morning of the Day of the Doctor' by Ingrid Oliver

Responding to a call from the Curator of the National Gallery’s Undergallery, Kate Stewart and Petronella Osgood learn that several paintings have mysteriously changed, their subjects disappearing from their canvases. When the Curator produces a message for the Doctor, Osgood sets about tracking him down...

Notes:
*Featuring Kate Stewart, Petronella Osgood, UNIT and the Curator

*This story is a prequel to 'The Day of the Doctor'

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Publication Date:
3rd October 2024

Notes:
*A BBC/Penguin Children's Book