Eve of the War (comic story)

Eve of War, reprinted as A Fresh Start, is the first story to feature the Mechanoids in comic form and as an explicit enemy of the Daleks. This story is also notable for its change of artists mid-way through the story, resulting in differences in style of Daleks, ships and all style and painted elements of the story. The Daleks' design shifts from one based on their appearance in the first Dalek story The Daleks to a design similar to the Dalek film (Dr. Who and the Daleks) released the year this story was first published.

Summary
A new chapter in Dalek history begins. Following the Monstron attack, the Daleks have rebuilt their city with new defences to warn them on any future invasion. With the threat of the rust plague and the Monstrons over, the Dalek Emperor orders the Daleks to resume their conquest of other planets with the next target being Oric as it contains valuable minerals. As it is further away than Alvega or Solturis, the Daleks are building a refuelling station when one of the Daleks comes under attack from a cloud in space. It goes insane and starts seeing other Daleks as its enemies and begins killing them. Watching from a cloaked spaceship, a Mechanoid reports to its leader Menoid that their 'suspicion' ray is successful and they wait for a rebellion among the Daleks to begin.

The rogue Dalek is restrained as the Red Dalek Leader says their radardroves have detected enemy messages in their space. They uncover the Mechanoid ship and destroy it. However, the Mechanoids return with two more ships. They melt the Dalek's flying saucer, killing the Red Dalek within. The Mechanoids issue a warning to the Daleks and say that they are to stay out of Mechanoid skies. Soon they plan to attack Skaro.

Back on Skaro, the Emperor Dalek extracts information about the Mechanoids from the Dalek affected by the 'suspicion' ray. As other Daleks begin to question who the Mechanoids are, the Emperor has the rogue Dalek's through patterns analysed and they receive information on their new enemies. The Emperor orders new weapons and defences to be built and begins mobilising the Dalek forces. War is coming.

Characters

 * Menoid
 * Dalek Emperor
 * Red Dalek Leader

Daleks

 * The Red Dalek Leader is one of the earliest known Red Daleks. It is killed when its saucer is melted by the Mechanoids.
 * A Dalek with a casing that alternates between black and white operates the Dalek Test Chamber

Dalek technology

 * Dalek sound scans can listen for things approaching up to 100,000 AUDs away from the North and South.
 * Videoscopes also watch for things around Skaro.
 * The Daleks use radardroves to detect signals in space.

Elements

 * The Daleks use H20 ballast in their saucers to blow the cloud hiding the Mechanoids' ship away.

Planets

 * The Daleks wish to mine the planet Oric for its valuable metals.

Spacecraft

 * Mechonoid Interceptors can travel at lightspeed.
 * The Mechanoids use force field protection on their ships, rendering the Daleks' weapons useless.
 * The Mechanoid interceptors can melt the Dalek flying saucers with their weapons.
 * The Daleks are building a space station in orbit of the Skaro as a refuelling station.

Species

 * Mechanoids are totally machine and have powerful positronic brains.
 * The Mechanoids can pierce the Daleks' brains and melt their casings.

Technology

 * The Mechanoids use a 'suspicion' ray.

Continuity

 * This is the first of the Mechonoid story arc. Dalek-Mechonoid combat was previously shown in TV: The Chase and COMIC: The World That Waits.
 * In The Chase, the Mechonoids were said to be robot servants built by humans for colonisation purposes but they were forgotten after interplanetary wars ended the Earth Empire's expansionist phase. In this story, the Mechonoids are an independent species. The main theory is that Mechonoids became their own species overtime after their abandonment but its more likely that the Humans salvaged Mechonoid technology to use for colonization but were less advanced than the originals. The TV21 Comic Strips are set prior to The Dalek Invasion of Earth and before humanity could colonise other worlds.