The Story:

This Segment brings with it the culmination of one part of this story - the part involving the companions. In this story, the Doctor traces the final segment down to a small museum, only to discover that someone has beaten him to the prize. What was in there the night before was now missing, and the locator indicates the item is no longer around.

So he has to track the item to its current location and hope to get it back. But for that, he has a plan. He sets the TARDIS console to materialize a few feet from the location of the Segment as soon as its coordinates stop moving through time and space.

When our trio arrives at the scene, the Master has just arrived. Sir Edmund recognizes his old foe, Sir Guy le Maître, immediately. This rather surprises the Doctor who looks askance of Sir Edmund. He reveals to the Doctor that this is the same knight who stole from him the object of his quest.

So the Master pulls his old trick - using the innocent to get his way. Thinking her just another helpless female, the Master threatens her with his Tissue Compression Eliminator.

Of course Sir Edmund knows something that by now even the reader may have forgotten - Elannuir is quite capable of taking care of herself.

Sir Edmund recovers the cup, which he believes to be the Holy Grail, and feels he has now succeeded in his quest - he has redeemed himself to his lady. He then reveals his true identity - he is Henry, son of Geoffrey, Count of Anjou, destined to be crowned Henry II, King of England.

I hope people didn't see this coming. And then it makes sense that he marries Elannuir of Aquatannis, who becomes known as Eleanor or Aquitaine.

And I get to play with my theory of the Holy Grail - that it simply got put back in the cupboard and its significance was not realized until it was no longer possible to even know which of the cups in the cupboard was the one Christ used.

And it's interesting to see that over the last few segments, Elannuir and Sir Henry have fallen in love. I think the incident with the Daleks really sealed the deal. The Doctor naturally assumes she isn't the marrying type, since they did rescue her from a forced marriage. And while Elannuir is surprised at Henry's proposal, she gladly accepts.

And as they are leaving, presumably somewhere on Henry's massive estate, the Doctor turns toward the TARDIS only to find its entrance blocked by a metal doorway. He finds himself under arrest.

 

The Museum:

I've wanted to do a musem story for a long, long time, and I thought this would be a great way to do it. I could line the walls with art, show off some cool miniature stuff I have, throw in a hidden joke or two, and refer back to past events.

Note the reference to Udjashu and Teos. Poor kid... I guess even Tanis limestone couldn't save him. Still, judging from the small size of the sarcophagus, Teos died as a child, but not as young as we see him in The Malkatese Falcon.

In reality, I'm not sure when Teos died, but he led a war in Persia, so I'd guess it wasn't as a child.

The wall also has some of my favorite art on it. My favorite Van Gogh: Starlight Over Rhone, and my favorite Monet (though that's a tough call, as I really love Monet's work.)

Starlight Over Rhone - Vincent Van Gogh
Arm of the Seine at Giverny at Sunrise - Claude Monet

 

Also included is The Girl in the Pearl Earring by Vermeer; a beautiful painting by Jack Vettriano called The Singing Butler; Rembrandt's most famous Self-Portrait; The Vetruvian Man, by Da Vinci; and The Persistence of Memory by Salvador Dali (especially appropriate due to its use of melting clocks). Not clearly in shot is La Giocanda (Mona Lisa) by Da Vinci.

Girl with the Pearl Earring - Jan Vermeer
The Singing Butler - Jack Vettriano
Self Portrait - Rembrandt
Vitruvian Man - Leonardo Da Vinci
Persistence of Memory - Salvador Dali
La Giocanda - Leonardo Da Vinci

I had some fun with a few piece of art too.

For example, I created a Mondrian painting with Lego pieces.

Another example is a piece I did for a Fark.com competition in which entrants were to photoshop a famous painting. I took Magritte's The Son of Man, and merged onto the face the famous image of a bullet tearing through an apple.

The Son of Man - Rene Magritte
Bullet Piercing Apple - Harold Edgerton (photo)
The final result

And on the left wall is a sample from that contest which, unfortunately, I am unable to credit, as I don't know who did it - a great Andrew Wyeth painting called Christina's World with crop circles!

Christina's World With Crop Circles - Unknwn Farker (based on painting by Andrew Wyeth)

 

The sharp eye may (or may not) notice that in the cabinet with the tinware is an irridescent blue stone (on the upper right in the pic).

This is an homage to The Ribos Operation, the first story in the Key to Time series. The stone is, of course, Jetric, which the Doctor converted to the first piece of the Key to Time in the original series.

Jethric, from The Ribos Operation

And not many people will know this, but the silver statuette seen in this picture is a silver-cast sculpture of an Olthoi, a creature I animated in the computer game Asheron's Call, seen here in a screenshot: The silver Olthoi was modeled and cast by Sue Anne Rische, a great friend of mine, who is a Really Cool Artist.


Olthoi from Asheron's Call

 

The Master:

Finding the Segment missing, the Doctor goes back to the TARDIS to find that the Segment is out of the timestream, much like before, in The Malkatese Falcon. He discovers that another TARDIS is involved, so he figures out how he should be able to track it down.

Upon exiting the TARDIS, the Doctor is surprised to see the Master, but not as surprised as he is to find that Sir Edmund recognizes him!

So as in any classic tale, this was a case where the good guy had to face the bad guy on his own. In this case, as there was an old score to settle, we find that it's down to Edmund (Henry) and the Master, except the Master, being the kind of guy he is, cheats and takes Elannuir by the neck, threatening to kill her with the Tissue Compression Eliminator.

Of course as we saw in Vengeance on Skaro, Henry/Edmund and Elannuir have each other's back, and this is no exception. While the reader is lulled into thinking there's now a helpless girl to rescue, we find that it is always a mistake to underestimate Elannuir, who steals the show, injuring the Master, allowing Edmund to finally claim his prize.

The Master is a Hasbro 12" Count Dooku figure, from Star Wars Episode III. I thought the Christopher Lee face was perfect for the Master's return in a normal body.

The Master's outfit is an amalgam of various outfits I had in my collection. The pants and boots, as well as his shirt (which are not really emphasized) are from the Dooku uniform, which is mostly black. The hands I swapped out for Gung Ho Grip black hands, which I thought appropriate.

The coat is from the Matrix Neo 12" figure - an excellent jacket. The scarf is from a 12" Sideshow Toy Van Helsing figure. I thought the addition of the scarf to be a great way to parallel the Doctor and the Master.

The Master's crippled locator is an identical copy of the Doctor's, but in clear red and clear yellow. When I was trying to put together a second locator for the Doctor, I found I had a red Lego rod, but not a white one. When I saw that, I first thought perhaps the Doctor's would change, now that the key was half-found, but after successfully recreating the Doctor's locator, I thought, "hey, this red locator would be awesome for the Master." Until then I had no plans for the Master to have his own locator.

For those who catch my subtle dialogue, I have gone through pains in this story to show that the Master and the Doctor are practically twins. Each is a renegade Time Lord meddling in other peoples' affairs, but of course most people would consider the Doctor good, and the Master evil. But really, what defines those terms? How can one or the other be good or evil if they basically do the same things?

In fact, at one point, when asked who the Master is, the Doctor describes him to Sir Edmund as: "He's another Timelord, though he hardly deserves to be called one.We trained together at the Academy. He's a renegade Timelord who stole a TARDIS and has been creating havoc, committing all sorts of crimes throughout the universe in his attempt to control other peoples' destinies."

The Doctor could just as easily be describing himself!

He goes on to say: "A very dangerous man and I believe he may now be working for the Black Guardian."

But something the Master lacks is understanding that he may not be the cleverest being in the universe. Here, he completely disregards the helpless female, and uses her to threaten our heroes. And to his own detriment, he underestimates Elannuir's skills as a warrior - she can take care of herself.

At this point the Doctor has a few words with the Master. He apologizes for something that happens either in their past or their future... this is a reference to what happens to the Master in my first Doctor Who story, "Redemption". This incident is in the Doctor's past, but who knows when it is in relation to the Master. All we know is his body is broken down at that point, while currently, it is in good condition.

Shots taken of the Master replicating and stealing the Horus statue were shot during the filming of Segment Three - The Malkatese Falcon.

Shots taken of the Master in Davros' copper bunker were taken during the filming of Segment Four - Vengeance on Skaro.

Note that when we first see the Master, then known as Sir Guy le Maître, very observant people may notice that along with his somewhat unusual armor, he is also wearing his Tissue Compression Eliminator. A bit of deliberate foreshadowing. Something people could look back on and say "Oh, look! It was there all along!"

What's that by Sir Henry's wrist, hanging from le Maître's belt?

The problem was, I wanted it to have a large gemstone on the front, and when I shot this scene, I had not found one. I eventually did, in some cheap costume jewelry, and glued it in place. I actually took a photo of the gem and pasted it into each shot in the flashback in which the Tissue Compression Eliminator is seen.

 

The Fight Over the Grail:

As the Master lies bleeding on the ground, awaiting perhaps a severe punishment for his failure, Sir Edmund retrieves the cup, and our trio leaves the scene.

Which allows him to reveal his secret, finally. Just what the heck is in that black sack he's carried with him from the beginning?

Sir Edmund of Sussex reveals that he is, in reality, Henry, meant to be crowned King of England. He was given a quest to find the Grail, and failed, thanks to the Master.

His quest complete, Henry can now go back home and fulfill his obligations without shame. But wait... the Doctor needs the Grail. All this effort, and Sir Edmund can't just take his prize and go home, because that would mean the Doctor couldn't finish his quest.

So the Doctor uses his reasoning skills and convinces Sir Henry that he has completed his quest just by recovering the Grail, and that returning home with it was not part of the quest description. And besides, he was given a second chance to fulfill his quest by helping the Doctor on his quest, and he agrees that his quest is complete, and by relinquishing this treasured artifact, he is helping the Doctor complete his own quest.

So he takes a golden, jewelled chalice instead, something that his followers would believe is the Grail.

We know that he doesn't reveal the Grail publicly, otherwise we'd all know about it, so I guess that wherever the real Grail sits to this day, it is in fact this gold, jewelled substitute, and not the real thing.

 

The Big Goodbye:

His quest complete, and his honor restored, Henry decides it is time to return to England. He requests of the Doctor to return him to his home. And he has another request. He wishes to return home to England to rule with Elannuir at his side.

This may come as a surprise, especially considering the circumstances surrounding Elannuir's joining of our crew. But we can see that while we may be surprised by this, and the Doctor is suprised by this, so too is Elannuir. But while the Doctor is reminding Sir Henry that Elannuir is not exactly the marrying type, she accepts.

She dons a dress appropriate for an appearance in twelfth century England (Barbie's Irish Princess Dress), and covers it with the cloak she wore to the museum, and hand in hand, she and Sir Henry part ways with the Doctor.

And as the Doctor is saying his farewells, he wishes them luck with the kids, because they'll need it. Look up the history of Henry and Eleanor's children... they did not not have a calm, friendly family relationship. Two of Henry and Eleanor's sons were the infamous King Richard, and King John, of Robin Hood fame. He knows this, but alas, the happy couple are bilssfully unaware.

 

The Arrest:

The Doctor is, himself, blissfully unaware at this point that his actions have been observed from the early stages of his quest. As he turns to enter his TARDIS, he discovers its doors blocked by a doorway, and someone is attempting to arrest him. More on that in the next Chapter.

 

The Storyboard:

You know the drill. Click for a larger image. You may find that this storyboard doesn't include a shot-for-shot panel ratio. That's because for a lot of chatter, I just didn't bother drawing panels.

Click any image for a larger one.

 

The First Shoot:

On Septmeber 5 (Labor Day weekend) I decided I'd shoot the exterior scene in which our intrepid heroes encounter Guy le Maître. I had scouted out this very old tree with an interesting root system months before. It's in the same park the majority of my exteriors are shot in, Bird Park in Walpole, MA.

Just the day before I scrabbled everything together that I'd need. I already had the tin cup painted, the red locator, le Maître, my heroes, the TARDIS... everything I needed, except my Greek Column (which I got for $9.99 at the Christmas Tree Shop the previous fall) was still white. It is simply plaster from a mold.

I bought some brown spraypaint, and did some research on what the Master's TARDIS looked like. Some photos I found online showed it as an almost beige gray, while the episode "Time Flight" clearly showed it as dark brown. So I went with that.

I debated whether or not to cut off the large square top and bottom, but opted not to as I wasn't sure the tools I had at hand wouldn't do more damage than good. Besides, it's close enough considering TARDISes like to change their look.

The sun when I arrived was dappling the ground under the tree, because it was about noon. This meant the sun shone directly down on the tree, having to penetrate all the leaves above before hitting my figures. However as the day went on the sun went down in the sky, leaving me much more direct sunlight and much less dappling.

Gnarled old tree in Bird Park, with TARDISes and junk.
(Click image for larger picture)

Also much more direct sun on me, which is never good. I usually get a dreadful headache (more on that later) if exposed to direct sun for too long. But I was wearing a nice brimmed straw hat and an overshirt to protect me from the sun's evil rays.

The upshot of this was that sometimes it was quite difficult to get a shot of a character whose face wasn't blown out to white by the sun, especially gaunt, pale le Maître. But I had no solution for it except to say "hey, it was a sunny day, sometimes faces blow out." A pro could have fixed it, though, I'm sure.

But I was pleased with the results for the most part.

And after almost exactly two hours after arrival, I packed up and left, drove home, where my wife and daughter were at the pool. I hung out there for a while, as this was the last day for the pool for the year.

 

Shoot Two:

So it's the evening of September 8, 2005. Thursday. I decided to shoot the TARDIS interior scenes. I get everything ready, pick up two boxes of TARDIS decorations from the storage room, as well as the TARDIS walls. But I can't find the rondelles anywhere. About 30 or so styrofoam cups that have been cut down to fit the holes in the walls.

So I get to the office, because I seem to recall seeing them there last, my my desk, in a plastic bag. But I've moved desks since then, and damn, I guess they got misplaced and tossed.

So Sean and I go to a nearby grocery store to get styrofoam cups. They have the 8 ounce cups, but not the 12 ounce cups, which I need for the walls.

So we go to a second grocery store, several miles away. By now, the time's getting on. I got off work early (around 4:30pm) and I figured I could get the shoot started by 6:30pm so Sean could get home early, and I didn't have to spend the whole night there. They have none either. Just the 8 ounce cups.

Sigh. At this point it's 7:00, and I say to Sean: "I guess this idea of starting at 6:30..." and he finishes with "... isn't very likely to happen." Funny stuff.

So we go to iParty in a nearby mall, and they have plenty of the 12 Ounce cups. We buy two packs (48) and head back to the office. I'm very hungry at this point and would like to have something to eat, but that'd only eat up more time. I'd get something after the shoot.

We get there, and I come up with this scheme of fitting a styrofoam cup into one of the holes and rotating it wit the carpet knife about 1/8" off the surface of the cardboard. This actually works very well, making for nice smooth cuts.

So we set the walls up, pop in the 30 or so rondelles, and put the TARDIS console in place...

... underneath the TARDIS console in its storage box... I find the plastic bag with all the styrofoam rondelles in it!!!

 

Shoot Three:

With two shoots under my belt in less than a few days I felt confident, and eager. I had one more exterior to shoot... the Doctor saying his farewells to Henry and Elannuir.

Sunday, September 11. I solemnly remember where I was four years previous. I was on my way to work and decided it was a lovely morning and decided to get a coffee at my favorite coffee shop when I heard an old lady say a plane hit the World Trade Center. I remember that day clearly. Ironically, I had a shoot planned for that day too, for my Adventure Team story: The Search For The Albino Bigfoot Sasquatch

Anyway, on this September 11, while my wife and daughter were at Church, I took my figures, my TARDIS and my Time Portal back to Bird Park where I scouted a nice field area which would be ideal for Henry to return to England in.

Before setting out, I already had the start of a headache, and I knew I would be shooting in the sun, which I knew would be torture for me without Excedrin. So I went to the kitchen, took some medicine, and left for the park. The sun was even more directly on me as I had no shade at all in the field, and my headache was not getting any better.

Usually Excedrin works wonders. I take it, and the headache goes. Well sir, this headache was sticking around. Determined not to let it ruin my shoot, I kept on trucking. And it was a difficult shoot. Every time I would set the three figures up (some shots required some distance between my figures) and got back to my camera, one or more of them would flop over in the mild breeze that was blowing through.

But still, I was amazed this headache had not gone away. So I thought back to the kitchen... I went in, grabbed the bottle, took a pill.... then I remembered I took a Pepcid AC instead of two Excedrin.

So while my headache continued unabated, my stomach felt fine.

This shoot took just under an hour, believe it or not, and included the shots of Henry and Elannuir's departure, the Time Cop's attempt to arrest the Doctor, and their entire conversation right up to when the Time Cop agrees to go with the Doctor.

I felt I owed myself a treat so I drove immediately to Guarinos to get some apple turnovers with whipped cream, to the grocery store to get Coffeemate, just in time to get home, pack away some stuff and drive to the church to get my family. When I got to the church, my wife said "Did you bring the gift?" as if I knew anything about what she was talking about. I was supposed to pick her up at church and come home, where she would go back to the church at 1:00pm for a baby shower, bringing with her the gift we bought for the Rector's new baby.

So it was off again - no rest for the wicked headace victim! Got the gift, came back and hung out at the church's coffee hour.

But while it was an amazingly hectic morning, with my activities timed down to the minute, I did get some good pictures.


Shoot Four:

The fourth shoot took place three days after the third, on a very hot early afternoon in Bird Park. I needed a long shot of lawn and trees and the park again provided.

It was a frustrating, though short, shoot mostly because a little wind kept knocking my figures over. This wasn't so bad during the three-shots, but the distant shot of Henry and Elannuir walking away was hard because when I'd run back to the camera, turn around, lie down and shoot, invariably, one of the two figures would fall over, meaning I had to get up again, run over, set them up again, and repeat the process. Eventually, I got a useable shot or two.

 

Shoot Five:

This was a fun shoot. Sadly, Sean Dickinson was not available for the shoot, though he was in the buildling. He was working so hard on Asheron's Call that he could not even take an hour off to help, but did drop by to see how things were going. I say sadly because this was the last shoot done for this whole series, and he's been involved from the beginning. Missing the last shoot was kind of sad because he didn't get to be there for the finish of our project.

No matter, I built the sets up, decorated the walls (by using hot glue to attach the frames) and screwed the walls together with long wood screws (you'd be surprised how well this works on this styrofoam!) and set up the displays in the museum.

I took a couple of shots of the construction process, but not too many.

A word on hot glue. In this process, pinning the frames up on painted stryofoam, each time perfectly with no chance at a second try (because it sticks like mad to this stuff) it is required to move quickly. Sometimes this means sticking your finger in molten hot glue.

Now to do this once is unfortunate. But to do it a second time, within a half-centimeter of the previous time just two minutes before, well, that's just plain stupid. Yep. Stupid. So of course I had to work on this shoot with a double-blistered right-hand ring finger.

 

Some Points of Interest:

After writing most of the scripts for this whole story my wife and I, and our daughter, visited Hammond Castle, in Gloucester, MA. It was a great place. I took some nice shots of my GI Joe Adventure Team Commander outside the castle for future use. There was also a Robin Hood's Faire going on there, and it was there that I purchased the knives used by Elannuir and Annin. They were letter-opener sets, and included those knives, and a version about twice the size or so, both in a shared scabbard. Each cost $6.00. I thought that quite a bargain!

This is a castle built on the model of an English castle, built by John Hays Hammond, Jr., holder of more US patents than anyone other than Thomas Alva Edison, and inventor of Radio Control, in the late 1920s. One thing to note is that Mr. Hammond claimed a family tie right back to - King Henry II of England!

While there, I snapped a photo of a gorgeous hand-rendered family tree, with the following detail.

Hammond Family Line...
...tracing back to Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine

Just another coincidence I encountered while producing this story. (I apologize for the flash flare... it was too dark in the room to take the picture without a tripod.)

 

Behind the Camera:

Here's me setting up the Doctor as the trio enters the room.
Here's me aiming the Security Officer so he's looking at the Doctor.
And look what arrived the week of this shoot! My new Sonic Screwdriver from England! This is a cool gadget! It has a UV light at the tip and an invisible-ink pen marker at the base. The light decodes the invisible ink! I used this light to reflect the Master's Tissue Compression Eliminator in the glass of the display case.

 

Bloopers:

My foot is in the way in this shot... didn't even notice it until I checked the pic in-camera.

A kid on a bike goes by at an inopportune moment.

That's the problem with a public park... people seem to walk by just when they're not wanted!

 

Goofing Around On The Set:

Sometimes the actors just get tired of all the repetitive work and take to improvisation. They get punchy, and break out in fits of giggles.

We sure had fun making this. I hope you had fun reading it.

 


This is a reference to "The Curse of the Fatal Death" in which Jonathan Pryce plays the Master. He wears two gold Dalek "Bumps" on his chest, and comments that they are Etheric Beam Locators... and they're very sensitive!