Spiral Scratch (novel)

Spiral Scratch was the seventy-first BBC Past Doctor Adventures novel. It was written by Gary Russell. It featured the Sixth Doctor and Mel. This was the final novel featuring the Sixth Doctor. It is also the final Sixth Doctor adventure overall, as the ending leads directly into TV: Time and the Rani.

The novel reveals the circumstances behind the Doctor's regeneration into his seventh incarnation, which were left a mystery in the televised version of the event. According to the novel, the Sixth Doctor was already dying by the time the Rani boarded his TARDIS after the events of this story, and her attack propagated the Sixth Doctor's inevitable death sooner than it would have occurred. As of 2013, it is the only account of the regeneration in a BBC-licensed venue.

Publisher's summary
Carsus: the largest repository of knowledge in the universe -- in any universe, for there is an infinite number of potential universes; or rather, there should be. So why are there now just 117,863? And why, every so often, does another one just wink out of existence?

The Doctor and Mel arrive on Carsus to see the Doctor’s old friend Professor Rummas -- but he has been murdered. Can they solve the mystery of a contracting multiverse, and expose the murderer?

With the ties that bind the Lamprey family to the past, present and future coming unravelled around him, only the Doctor can stop the descent into temporal chaos. But he is lost on Janus 8. And Schyllus. And a twentieth-century Earth where Rome never fell. And...

Plot
to be added

Characters

 * Sixth Doctor
 * Melanie Bush
 * Monica Lamprey
 * Shepherd Mullen
 * Rummas
 * Joseph Tungard
 * Richard de Calne
 * Sir Bertrand Lamprey
 * Helen Lamprey

The Doctor

 * The Doctor's final words to Mel before his regeneration into his seventh incarnation are, “Don’t cry Mel. It was my time. Well, maybe not, but it was my time to give. To donate. I’ve had a good innings you know, seen and done a lot. Can’t complain this time. Don’t feel cheated. (Mel replies, 'But it's not fair!') Yes...it is...” His actual last words as the Rani prepares to attack his TARDIS are, "Local...tractor beam..."

Astronomical objects

 * Garrett is a gas giant.

Individuals

 * Rummas is a Time Lord and a friend of the Doctor who lives on Carsus.
 * An alternate version of Peri Brown is said to have sacrificed her life for her version of the Doctor.
 * Among the alternate versions of Mel is a human-Silurian Hybrid known as Melanie Baal.

Locations

 * The Spiral Chamber is a portal to the spiral in the Time Vortex.
 * In an alternate timeline, the Doctor visited Huttan in 2267, Narrah in 2721, Ch'zzz in 3263, Schyllus in 4387 and Helios 3 in 5738.

Science

 * Among the phenomena mentioned by Professor Rummas is strange matter fragments.

Continuity

 * The Doctor and Mel have recently visited Kolpasha. (PROSE: Instruments of Darkness)
 * Mel witnesses several different versions of the Doctor, including one with a penguin, presumably Frobisher. Two Doctors wear blue coats. Both are accompanied by a lady in her fifties, who is meant to be Evelyn Smythe. (WC: Real Time)