The Seers of Dronid (Quantum series)

The Seers of Dronid is the second episode of season 33 and is written by Steven Moffat and Marc Platt.

Plot
The identity of the Silence is revealed along with its connection with ancient Gallifrey. ==Synopsis ==

 Jack, Amy and The Doctor are now sitting around a wooden table in Chronotis’ rooms as the old man himself with a tray of tea enters, they all start drinking when the Doctor asks the obvious ‘so you’re alive’, Chronotis starts to explain that he sensed the war, and when no one came to bring him back to Gallifrey he built psychic barriers around himself blocking most scans. The two start talking about the current situation and Chronotis both agree that even pooling both their TARDIS’ resources they still won’t be able to cover the whole of space-time in any human life span in relative time. Amy seems to hunch over her mug of tea and sniffles tears but the Doctor then says that he’s got an idea, it’s a long shot but with two Time Lords, it might just work the scene cuts as Chronotis asks the Doctor to elaborate.

 The same cell that Rory was in now has another occupant; River lies unconscious on the floor with Rory at her side as she wakes up she calls Rory daddy and asks what has happened, Rory tells her he was on his way home when the creatures that made up the silence came and took him away, he then summarises what’s happened since then in the prison cell. River asks how long she’s been unconscious for Rory tells her not long, then he asks something, it’s similar to when he was on the TARDIS, but when Kovarian first entered the cell he saw that behind her the corridor was white and featureless, but when the door opened again he could swear there was a blue corridor in its place, River doesn’t seems to believe him, she says that architectural reconfiguration as part of the TARDIS internal systems seems to be a distinctly Time Lord technology and the ship they’re on isn’t, she says that as the child of the TARDIS she would be able to tell, although she doesn’t look to convinced.

 Amy, Jack and the Doctor are back in the TARDIS, the Doctor once again wearing the glasses whirls around the six man console before opening a communications channel the Chronotis’ TARDIS and asks if he’s ready to begin. Chronotis’ response is less than inspiring but is a positive to the question, the Doctor then reaching the primary controls calls for them to start tandem dematerialisation. We hear two distinct TARDIS noises as both of the Time Lord time-ships plunge into the vortex as one. Amy and Jack seem to be bonding as they talk about their adventures with the Doctor as Amy laughs at Jack’s impression of the ninth Doctor’s ‘Bananas are good’ impression. Amy tells him of Vincent van Gogh, Starship UK and other adventures as Jack mentions the year that never was, the Medusa Cascade incident, he then starts saying that this version of the Doctor and Jack recently spent 30 years travelling together, well he corrects himself saying 30 years for him, Jack say’s there was an accident and the TARDIS fell into the vortex and the Doctor had to spend a decade fixing the systems. Chronotis’ voice suddenly booms over the comms saying that his TARDIS is being asked for an authentication code, the Doctor goes to one of the screens and types something in then turns back to the main console saying that he’s relaying the codes now, the TARDIS materialisation sound kicks in and the two wooden doors to Chronotis TARDIS seem to appear without anything to hold them up, the time rotor in the Doctor’s TARDIS stops and Chronotis walks to the console as the Doctor tells Amy and Jack that they’ve arrived. The Doctor takes a data crystal and leads them out of the TARDIS, they walk out into a ruined corridor, filled with damaged Time War era Daleks, all dead. The Doctor warns them not to touch the casings saying their systems may not be completely dead and that touching it could allow the Dalek to regenerate using the background arton energies picked up by travel through the time vortex. When Amy asks where they are the Doctor explains that they are on a Time Lord research station known as the cruciform, he further states that during the early days of the Time War the Daleks were able to overrun the place, eventually a Time Lord strike force came back and fire-stormed the place to stop the powers of the place coming under Dalek control. When asked to clarify he seems to avoid the subject and dam right says that it’s classified when pressed for information.

 Sometime later in a large room on the same installation a large double door opens with the figure of eight seal of Rassilon is above the doors, the Doctor, Chronotis, Amy and Jack walk in with the Doctor at the lead, he walks up to a crystal stalactite, places the crystal from the TARDIS onto the summit, before placing both hands onto the smooth crystal and closing his eyes in concentration. Jack reaches out to touch a Dalek but Amy slaps his hand back reminding him what the Doctor said about using their artron energy to regenerate, they don’t need a Dalek running around on top of their problems even with two Time Lords. Chronotis then moves to the opposite side of the crystal to the Doctor, then places his hands on it in a similar way the two start to mutter old high Gallifreyan under their breath before pulling back as circular Gallifreyan symbols appear as a hologram in the air, the Doctor clearly excited says the cruciform’s downloading the relevant information to the TARDIS NAVCOM unit for a direct trip. The symbols briefly flash green and at the Doctor’s nod the four start their walk back to the TARDIS.

 Back on the Doctor’s TARDIS both Time Lords exit the wooden double doors of Chronotis’ TARDIS and head to the console, both moving in tandem taking three panels each, making the trip much smoother than any usual trip. After a while the Doctor calls to Amy and Jack that they’re nearly there, the two of them having dozed off on the two armchairs in the console room, both rush to the console to see the overhead holographic display showing the red glow of the vortex and the large bulk of a black time-ship in front of them. Chronotis says that TARDIS scans show that it’s an old model Nekkestani time cruiser; the Doctor adds that it’s pre-time war era ship. Chronotis adds that they’ve adjusted both their TARDIS’ power curves to be undetectable to such an old ship. Jack then asks how they’re getting Rory out of their Chronotis snorts and asks what the Doctor’s planning, to which the Doctor replies that ‘maybe we’ve found a use for that dammed Jabberwock. Which seems to confuse the others to which the Doctor gives a brief description of the anti-time crisis (Audio: Zagreus), Chronotis adds that in the redraft of history when his fourth self was snatched into the Death Zone (TV: The Five Doctors) it was this eighth incarnation who took care of Skagra and the sphere (Audio: Shada). The Doctor smiles nostalgically to which he says his misses Romana, Narvin, Brax and Leela, after this Jack gently pats the Doctor’s shoulder which he reaches up to touch and thanks him before moving to another sector of the console then adjusting the overhead hologram to show the interior showing a large hanger bay, the Doctor says that they can drop of the Jabberwock in there as a distraction while they will go to the that just started to glow red on the overhead map. As he heads towards the double doors he glances to the side where a cupboard rests next to the doors, he takes a deep breath and walks over to it. Inside we can see the larger Time Lord staser rifles standing up at a slant in a crystal alcoves, the Doctor takes one of them shows Jack the trigger and tells him that it’s set to stun with a physic target system, so as long as you picture which person you want to shoot and are facing them. He then hands Chronotis and Amy to small hand guns saying that they are called masers and use microwaves to stimulate emotions, the ones he’s giving are set to serious indifference, so anyone hit won’t care about what’s going on, they might notice, but they won’t care.

 The episode starts at Stormcage as we see River reading a book speculating on Time Lord history before a bolt of green energy rips through the air and kills the guard, as River jumps up Kovarian appears behind her and tells her not to bother, they can do anything to her now as emphasised by a stun blast hitting her from behind.