Frayed

Novella | Tara Samms | 2003

If I have come across a free source for consuming this adventure, I will list/link it here

Content Warning/s

death, gore, blood mentions, attempted genocide, unreality, eugenics

First Thoughts

A bit of a gory adventure. Reads like a typical adventure for the doctor in the future, and not really what I expected from a First Doctor story considering what I've read already, but I'm here for it.

This story claims to be the beginning of the Doctor calling themselves Doctor, and Susan calling herself Susan. I cannot quite reconcile this with the adventures I've engaged in so far, so I'm going to put this down to inacurate narrating.

When?

Cannot pinpoint much of a date/time. The bulk of the adventure takes place perhaps over 24-48hours. The story is definitely set in humanity's future. We've traveled to the stars and now we are exporting our eugenic experiments so it's not in our backyards staring at us in our faces.

Where?

Iwa, a planet being colonised by humans, several days signal away from Earth.

Notable Quotes

"names could be dangerous, they could give you away"

"it's a marrow line that marks a hero from a fool"

"things that are scared lash out and hurt others sometimes, without really meaning to"

"if weapons are used in place of words, any hopes of ending the conflict between your two races will be ended"

"he had to make sure the Doctor's manic ideas work"

Gadgets & Habadashery

The Doctor's clothes are destroyed and he must wear doctor's fatigues for the entire adventure. (That's where he supposedly gets the name).

Accurate or Anachronistic?

Susan has long hair in this story. No other notes at this time.

Death Count

  • Mentors Parm & Baine (2)
  • "Soldiers" - Thane, Mette, Sanderson, Marsh & 3 other unnamed soldiers (7)
  • Foxes (2)
  • Cass (1)

There are mentions of historical deaths also, but I have not counted these as they didn't occur in the story.

Energy Alignment

The Doctor is self-assured, determined, and has a lot of anxiety about retreiving Susan. He's also cheekily clever in the way he ingratiates himself with the crew at the Refuge; he lets them create a story of assumptions and then agrees to them.

Adventuring Mentions

Nothing explicit.

Screams!

Susan (2) & Juniper (2) are the only screamers for fear's sake. The foxes also scream, but I think this is just a descriptor for one of their ways of communicating so I didn't count these.

Litmus Tests

The Bechtel test passes, at the very least because Susan and Jill talk about cats. But most of the conversation by the female characters are either about Mosely (the Co-ordinator) or Olmec (Jill's fatherly figure).

The Race Bechtel test doesn't pass, as far as I'm aware the only person of colour is Olmec.

Other Stats

Well, the reason the Refuge exists is because of a "eugenics code" towards children with a predisposition which increases their likelihood to criminal tendencies; so it's not looking good for diversity.

Social Issue Focus

I would read this story as a critique on xenophobia and the rise of such. If we aren't careful, we will be locking up and traumitising Earth's children for the sake of social cohesion..

And the moral of the story is...

Create dialogue with those who you perceive as your enemies. Without dialogue, there's endless and senseless fighting/violence. Sometimes conflict can be solved through conversation, compassion and compromise.

Thoughts & Collections

Fanart

Nothing yet...

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