Anathema was a Remote colony located on the side of a planet-sized warship which spent centuries travelling through space towards Earth.
History[]
Warship[]
During the Vampire Wars, the Time Lords designed a planet-sized warship shaped like a disk and patterned with an omniscate, (PROSE: The Infinity Doctors [+]Lance Parkin, BBC Books (1998)., Interference - Book Two [+]Lawrence Miles, BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures (BBC Books, 1999).) which could cause neural spasms in creatures from outside the universe. At the ship's centre was the Cold. (PROSE: Interference - Book Two [+]Lawrence Miles, BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures (BBC Books, 1999).) However, the Vampire Wars ended before the weapon could be used. (PROSE: The Infinity Doctors [+]Lance Parkin, BBC Books (1998)., Interference - Book Two [+]Lawrence Miles, BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures (BBC Books, 1999).)
After Norval's TARDIS was destroyed by a ball of energy from the Needle, acting-President Voran planned to deploy the warship against the Needle, worried that the people there had control of the Effect. He called it the ultimate countermeasure. However, the Doctor and Larna stopped him from using the Great Key to activate it. (PROSE: The Infinity Doctors [+]Lance Parkin, BBC Books (1998).)
During the War in Heaven, the Time Lords deployed the ship against 20th century Earth, which they knew to be a major historical nexus as well as their enemy's original homeworld. Since they knew the enemy would block the attack if they put the ship straight into Earth's orbit, the Time Lords sent it out from one of their bases at sublight speed, planning for it to reach Earth in three billion years, at which point they would decide whether or not they needed to activate it; if they chose to activate it, Earth would be destroyed, and the causal nexus of the universe would unravel, erasing the Time Lords and their enemy alike. (PROSE: Interference - Book Two [+]Lawrence Miles, BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures (BBC Books, 1999).)
Remote colony[]
In 1799, Mother Mathara brought a group of the Remote to Anathema after the Second Wave destroyed Ordifica. Members of this group included Fitz Kreiner and Laura Tobin. (PROSE: Interference - Book Two [+]Lawrence Miles, BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures (BBC Books, 1999)., The Book of the War [+]Lawrence Miles, et al., Faction Paradox novels (Mad Norwegian Press, 2002).) Around this time, Father Self deposited Giordano Bruno onto Anathema to integrate into the Remote. (PROSE: De Umbris Idearum [+]Philip Purser-Hallard, Burning with Optimism's Flames (Faction Paradox, Obverse Books, 2013).)
The central focus of Anathema was the transmitter which held "the media", a medium through which all occupants of Anathema received the signals.
By the time that Anathema arrived in local Earth space, Laura Tobin and Fitz Kreiner had been re-remembered through the use of remembrance tanks and had new identities as Compassion and Kode. (PROSE: Interference - Book One [+]Lawrence Miles, BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures (BBC Books, 1999).)