Millennial Rites (novel)

Millennial Rites was the fifteenth novel in the Virgin Missing Adventures series. It was written by Craig Hinton and featured the Sixth Doctor and Melanie Bush in an adventure that took place before the events seen in Terror of the Vervoids, Mel's first television appearance. This story was notable for playing with an issue posed in The Ultimate Foe - how the Doctor could become the Valeyard.

Publisher's summary

 * "The Millennium, Mel: the last New Year's Eve of the Twentieth century. But it's definitely not party time."

England, 1999: the Sixth Doctor and Mel have come to London to celebrate the new year with old friends — and to heal old wounds. But others are making more sinister preparations to usher in the new millennium. A software house is about to run a program that will change the fabric of reality. And an entity older than the universe is soon to be reborn.

When Anne Travers' fear of the Great Intelligence and millionaire philanthropist Ashley Chapel's secret researches combine, London is transformed into a dark and twisted mirror image populated by demons and sorcerers. Only the Doctor can put things right, but his friends have also been shockingly changed and he cannot trust anybody — least of all himself.

Characters

 * Sixth Doctor/The Valeyard
 * Melanie Bush/Melaphyre
 * Ashley Chapel/Ashmael
 * Yog-Sothoth
 * Saraquazel
 * Dame Anne Travers/Anastasia
 * Julia Prince
 * Barry Brown/Bartholomew
 * Derek Peartree
 * James Campling
 * Cassie
 * David Harker/Harklaane
 * Louise Mason/Louella

Worldbuilding

 * The Doctor briefly transforms into the Valeyard through a combination of magic and regeneration.
 * Shub-Niggurath conquered the planet Polymos and colonised it with her offspring, the Nestene Consciousness.

Foods and beverages

 * The Doctor drinks wine.

Continuity

 * I², OffNet and Ashley Chapel all previously appeared in PROSE: System Shock.
 * The Doctor had previously faced the Quarks and their Giant Wasps on Gano. (COMIC: The Killer Wasps)
 * James Stevens had been directed to Ashley Chapel when researching the death of Tobias Vaughn. (PROSE: Who Killed Kennedy)
 * The Doctor once again laments the destruction of his sonic screwdriver by the Terileptil leader in September 1666 and opines that he should have sued the Terileptils for criminal damage. (TV: The Visitation, PROSE: The Crystal Bucephalus)
 * Professor Edward Travers was discredited after the London Incident, as many regarded it as being his fault. (TV: The Web of Fear) However, his daughter's career has been more successful. She is now Dame Anne Travers OBE and has served as chief scientific advisor to the Cabinet since 1981, having succeeded her University of Cambridge lecturer and mentor Professor Rachel Jensen. (TV: Remembrance of the Daleks, PROSE: The Scales of Injustice)
 * On the same night, the Seventh Doctor and an older version of Mel gate crashed the New Year's Eve party being thrown by Alisha Hammerson, the Auton head of Hammerson Plastic PLC, in London. They foiled her plan to replace her guests with Auton replicas so the Earth could be dominated and absorbed by severing her link to the Nestene Consciousness. (COMIC: Plastic Millenium) Eight hours later in San Francisco, an older version of the Seventh Doctor regenerated into his eighth incarnation. After an initial bout of amnesia, the newly regenerated Doctor stopped from stealing his body and destroying the Earth, with the help of Dr. Grace Holloway. (TV: Doctor Who) Also during and after these events, London, along with the rest of England and the world, were hit by the Y2K bug, which the Voracians attempted to worsen and utilize in a plan to rebuild the A.I. Voracia and take over the world's technology, with the assistance of Prime Minster Terry Brooks's cabinet. Through the efforts of the Fourth Doctor and Harry Sullivan, their efforts were defeated. (PROSE: Millennium Shock)
 * Ashley Chapel is the scientist who helped Tobias Vaughn create the monolithic circuits that helped the Cybermen in their attempt to invade Earth when they were allied with Vaughn. (TV: The Invasion)
 * The Doctor became the Valeyard as was shown he would in TV: The Ultimate Foe though he was able to turn back.