The Golden Ones (comic story)

The Golden Ones saw the return of Axos, its first appearance since The Claws of Axos.

Summary
In Japan children are addicted to the new drink and TV show Goruda. A drink that makes them telepathic...and golden!.

Part 1
Tokyo, present day: Mr Okada walks into the office of Mr Kin, head of the Shining Dawn Corporation, and asks Mr Kin whether he has accepted his company's proposal to launch a product called Goruda into Europe. Mr Kin says that he is fully aware that Mr Okada is a spy working for UNIT, and that Okada's company is a fake. Suddenly, Mr Kin transforms into a creature, and pushes Mr Okada out of the window, killing him.

Two days later, the Doctor and Amy are at a UNIT briefing. The Doctor asks Major Hiraki what is the Shining Dawn Corporation, and what is Goruda. Major Hiraki suggests the Doctor should see for himself. Later, Amy and the Doctor turn up at a family's house, pretending to make a documentary about Japanese life. Kaito, a small child, is watching Goruda on the TV. Goruda says "Drink the brain tonic, one, two, three, and lets learn together!" Kaito's mother says his exam results has shot up ever since he started drinking the tonic and watching Goruda. The Doctor asks Kaito if he knows the name of Mozart's pet cat. The Doctor and Amy visit more houses.

Back at base, Major Hiraki says to the Doctor that, according to the publicity, the tonic increases the number of links between neurons. The Doctor says that when he asked first child he visited, Kaito, the name of Mozart's cat, he didn't know. The Doctor told him "Fluffy". From then on, when the Doctor asked other children, they all said "Fluffy", implying that the drink makes the children telepathic. Anyway, "Mozart hated cats", according to the Doctor. Hiraki says the lab results suggest the tonic is nothing but H20. The Doctor drinks it, and confirms it as water. He takes it back to the TARDIS for further testing.

Whilst walking to the station, the Doctor notices that Sergeant Machi, a UNIT man from the base, is following them. Suddenly, Machi starts firing lasers at them, and they run into the tube. They believe they are safe, but Machi is clinging onto the window. He breaks the window and tries to kill the Doctor. The tube comes out of the tunnel and the Doctor climbs onto the roof, with Machi following. One of the passengers pull the emergency stop switch, and the train skids to a halt. Amy rushes outside, believing the Doctor fell of the roof. However, he is clinging onto the back of the train, alive, whilst Machi is a pile of alien goo on the track, dead. Meanwhile, an alien voice says to Mr Kin, "We must bring our plans forward. Begin conversion."

The Doctor wants Amy safe, so he suggests she go to Major Hiraki's place whilst he tests the tonic in the TARDIS. Hiraki and Amy go to Hiraki's home, and they see that her daughter, Takara, is watching Goruda. Whilst Takara is being told off, Amy gets a call from the Doctor, who says that the tonic contains a chameleon molecule, meaning that it comes up with the result water for every test, and that the tonic becomes more powerful every time it's swallowed.

Suddenly, Goruda says,"Drink the brain tonic, one, two, three, and place your hands against the screen!" Every child who drank it goes into a trance and place their hands against the TV screen. The Doctor realises the chameleon molecule can absorb energy which has change living tissue. Kaito, Takara and all the others suddenly become wide eyed. with golden skin, chanting "We are golden! We are golden!". The Doctor finally remembers that the tonic increases the number of links between neurons. The links between neurons are called Axons. The Axons storm the street.

Part 2
The Axons start killing everyone in their path. The Doctor runs out of the TARDIS to a barricade made by UNIT, and he tells Captain Yoshida to stop firing for three reasons. One: the Axons are inhabiting the bodies of children. If the Axon within a child dies, then the child dies as well. Two: Axons are virtually indestructable. And three: humans aren't. Yoshida agrees, and goes with the Doctor's idea of keeping the public safe. Then Amy and Major Hiraki turn, saying they were "lucky to get out of Hiraki's house alive". They drive to UNIT HQ, whilst the Doctor explains to Amy that the Axons are 'space parasites' that consume planets by preying on the gullible and the greedy (presumably the reason why they came back to Earth).

At the UNIT base, there is an estimate of 50,000 - 70,000 children affected, and at least a thousand of them are heading towards UNIT HQ. The Doctor creates a hat that can tune in to the Axos pyshic wavelength, and jam it, thus saving the children. However, before he can plug it in (the hat needs electricity to work), the power goes out. The Axons have infilitrated the base, and have absorbed the electricity. The Doctor, Amy, Hiraki, and the surviving UNIT soldiers head to the roof, where a helicopter is waiting. However, the helicopter shoots the building and flies away. The Doctor asks Yoshida for a grappling hook, and the Doctor shoots it at the nearest skyscraper. Amy and the UNIT soldiers go down first. The Axons make it to the roof, just as the Doctor goes down the grappling wire yelling "Geronimo!". In the skyscraper, the Doctor prepares to plug in the hat, but suddenly Amy and Hiraki turn into Axons (the real Axon form, not the golden form). The Doctor explains that Amy and Hiraki are Axon replicants, like Sargeant Machi. The Axons start tearing through the UNIT soldiers to get through to the Doctor and his hat, but the Doctor uses the hat to cut the link between Axos and the Axon replicants. Mr Kin appears on a TV screen in the room, stating that he is holding Amy and Hiraki hostage. The Doctor uses his hat to break the psychic link between the children, freeing them all. However. Mr Kin reveals that, without the psychic link, the children will soon die, and says that he will kill Amy and Hiraki unless the Doctor turns the psychic link for the children back on. The Doctor is torn between letting the children die or...

"And that is why we shall win!" says the head of the company.

Part 3
The Doctor is thinking, trying to come up with a good plan. When Yoshida mentions that the Axons\children have woken up, the Doctor hatches a plan. He calls Tokyo city hall, and tells them to barricade themselves in whilst the Doctor uses the hat to stun the Axons for one minute. Meanwhile, Amy and Hiraki are locked in a cell with the real Seargent Machi, but are released by Chiyoko, a young girl who had previously been seen with Axos.

Arriving at the mayor's office, the Doctor requests the blueprints for the Shining Dawn Corporation building, believing that Axos' spacecraft form is buried beneath it. While the Doctor is occupied, Axos contacts the mayor, claiming that they only require enough power to recharge their ship so they can leave. The mayor believes him, and has the power of a local nuclear plant channelled to the Shining Dawn building. At the same time, the Doctor discovers that the blueprints for the building are blank. When the energy is transferred, the entire tower starts shifting and changing, with Amy and the others still inside. The Doctor realises, to his horror, that the building was not built over the Axos craft, but is the Axos craft.

Part 4
As Axos begins to rampage through Tokyo, Chiyoko leads Amy and Hiraki to safety, but is unable to prevent Machi from being killed. Amy and Hiraki are then rescued via helicopter by Yoshida and the Doctor, who has them land at the power plant. Once there, the Doctor uses his telepathic hat to convince the children to resist Axos. Their combined mental energies form a giant Goruda, who then attacks Axos. Using this diversion, the Doctor attempts to reverse the power plant's feed to Axos. Unable to do so, he contacts every home in Tokyo, telling them to turn on every electrical device they have. This causes the power plant's energies to be drawn away from Axos, weakening and killing it. As "Mr. Kin" dies, he tells Chiyoko that she promised him a world to feed. She tells him that it was all necessary for a "new life" to begin.

With Axos' hold over the children gone, Tokyo returns to normal, and Hiraki decides to take some time off to be with her daughter.

Characters

 * Eleventh Doctor
 * Amy Pond
 * Mr Okada
 * Mr Kin
 * Chiyoko
 * Major Hiraki
 * Captain Yoshida

Continuity

 * Axos first appeared in DW: The Claws of Axos, nearly 40 years prior to the publication of this strip.

Timeline
to be added