The Silvering (comic story)

 was the third story of the Doctor Who: The Eighth Doctor comic book mini-series, published in 2016.

Summary
Edinburgh, 1850. The Doctor and Josie Day visit a mysterious magic show, one which is replacing audience members with 'Silvered' duplicates, mirror dimension reflections who jealously watch their real-world counterparts! With the deadly doppelgängers causing chaos, can the Doctor and Josie escape the magician's grasp and avoid being Silvered themselves?

Plot
In Edinburgh, in the year 1866, the Doctor leads Josie to a theatre to watch a magic show. Settling in before the show starts, Josie befriends Agnes who reveals that she and her brother Jack won their tickets.

Before Josie can ask more, the show commences with the Silversmith introducing himself. After some token magic tricks, he unveils a pair of mirrors, stepping through one and emerging from its twin. To prove his feat, the Silversmith invites volunteers to pass through the mirrors, Agnes among them, much to the concern of her brother. Though all three volunteers step in and out of the mirrors, the Doctor and Josie note that something is off about Agnes.

Returning to the theatre that evening, after noticing that Agnes had no reflection after the show, the Doctor and Josie go exploring and find one of the mirrors. Scanning it, the Doctor finds it to be giving off exotic energy before his reflection speaks and says that the mirrors are portals. Before they can prod more, the Silversmith arrives, his words allowing the Doctor to deduce that the mirrors lead to another world, the people who go in being replaced by their reflections. Amused, the Silversmith calls upon his army of widowed reflections, half-formed beings whose sheer numbers force the Doctor and Josie into the portal.

The two emerge in a cell but still in Edinburgh. The Doctor deduces that they are in a pocket of unreality, a dark reflection of N-Space. As they once stood in a theatre, a place of laughter and joy, they are now in a prison. Exploring, the two find the real Agnes. Examining the equipment, the Doctor realises that this is not a prison at all, but rather a psychic farm. Opening the cells, the Doctor instructs Josie to guide everyone to safety while he opens the heaviest door, freeing the original Silversmith and carrying him back to the mirror.

Emerging back in the theatre, the widowed reflections assault Josie before the Doctor steps through with the Silversmith, sending his villainous counterpart back through the portal. Before the doppelgänger can cross back, the Doctor shatters the mirrors, severing the link between the realities.

Catching her breath, Josie tries to lighten the mood only for the Doctor to grimly regard his own reflection in one of the cracked shards.

Characters

 * Eighth Doctor
 * Josie Day
 * Jack
 * Agnes
 * Mirror Agnes
 * The Silversmith
 * The Mirror Silversmith
 * Mirror Eighth Doctor

Worldbuilding

 * Josie compares the alternative version of Edinburgh on the other side of the portal to Alice in Wonderland.

Continuity

 * The magic show at the Theatre Royal in Edinburgh in 1866 was one of the places on the Doctor's 'to do' list. (COMIC: The Pictures of Josephine Day)
 * The Doctor says that he doesn't like empty theatres because he worries he might be attacked by a homunculus or a giant rat. (TV: The Talons of Weng-Chiang)
 * The Doctor finds a Spherion crystal. (COMIC: Music of the Spherions)
 * The Doctor would later traverse other portals that appear in the form of a mirror during his tenth (TV: The Girl in the Fireplace, COMIC: Mirror Image, PROSE: Martha in the Mirror) and thirteenth incarnations. (TV: It Takes You Away)
 * The Doctor had previously been to the year 1866 during his second incarnation. (TV: The Evil of the Daleks)