The Last Message (short story)

 was the second of five Time Lord Victorious short stories released by Eaglemoss Collections. It was printed in DWFC TLV 1, which came with the Dalek Drone and Dalek Emperor Figurine Set. It was written by James Goss.

Summary
The Daleks receive a chilling message from their future... but also from their past. Echoing forward from the Dark Times, a message from the last Dalek warns them that time is broken, and that the Doctor is to blame.

Plot
One phrase echoes through the Emperor's chamber on Skaro: "I... am... the... last...". These words had been found echoing through the Dalek City. This message had come from a Dalek drone, and normally the Emperor paid no attention to drones. However, today he had made an exception.

From his chamber, the Emperor watches on the screen as the broken Dalek, embedded in rock, still fights for survival. The message continues: "I survived... I will repair..." This doesn't surprise the Emperor. All drones are programmed to keep going and obey their instruction; that is their programming.

"I will grow stronger" continues the drone, "no matter how long it takes". The Emperor watches the dataflow, which tells him that not only is the message thousands and thousands of years old, but that the Dalek would surely have died three thousand years before sending the message. "There is still time..." continues the drone.

The Emperor starts to become displeased when the drone's voice takes on a tone of desperation and plea, wondering what other interceptors would have thought of the Daleks after listening to this message. "I must warn the universe..." it continues. The Emperor looks over at another panel and notes with intrigue that researchers had matched this Dalek with another in the registry, causing the Emperor to pause the recording and further analyse the data.

The Emperor allows himself the luxury of using the word "interesting" to describe this finding. The Emperor knows that the Dalek on the screen is also present on Skaro today. This Dalek is currently part of a 100 man crew aboard a Time Squad, and the Emperor knew that one day the drone would travel back in time, possibly due to a failed mission, and would send the message in an attempt to warn the Daleks of their failure.

In their research into time travel and manipulation, the Daleks had become time sensitive, and the Dalek Emperor had long suspected that the Time Lords had discovered this and had been altering their history in an attempt to keep them at bay. Despite drones not having expertise in temporal politics or physics, the Emperor wonders whether this drone had learnt something... perhaps something incriminating regarding the Time Lords.

"I must warn the universe," continues the message as the Emperor allows it to conclude, "about the Doctor." The Emperor finds himself interested once again. Allowing strategies to swim around his giant brain, a job normally left to the Dalek Time Strategist, he uses this newfound information to formulate a new path for the Dalek Empire.

The Emperor had concluded that time itself was under attack and no-one was immune, not even his Empire. Requiring more information, the Emperor knows that the information he requires would be located at the Archive of Islos. He could visit this Archive and find out just how the Doctor was involved. Leaving the lowly drone's remains to rot, the Dalek Emperor leaves his chamber and heads for his fleet.

Characters

 * Dalek Emperor
 * A Dalek Drone

Continuity

 * The Emperor decides to get more information from the Archive of Islos. (WC: The Archive of Islos)
 * The Emperor discovers that the Doctor has done something catastrophic to time. (PROSE: The Knight, The Fool and The Dead)
 * The drone in question would later be discovered by the Starship Future. (GAME: The Hollow Planet, AUDIO: Genetics of the Daleks)