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The Eminence was a gaseous entity and psychic force that encountered the Doctor on several occasions.

Abilities[]

The Eminence travelled across the universe in teleportation caskets. It could control the minds of any being it came into contact with, as long as it inhaled the breath of forever, turning them into its Infinite warriors. (AUDIO: The Seeds of War)

Biography[]

Named for the acronym for Memetic Neural Network (MNN), (AUDIO: Eye of Darkness) the Eminence was the brainchild of Markus Schriver, a scientist at the Ides Scientific Institute who believed that mentally controlled ships would streamline spaceflight. Schriver re-engineered memetic particles at the molecular level, creating a suspended compound that mimicked the human brain. The Reborn Master added extra ingredients to the gas, including a "scoop of residual Vortex emissions for energy storage and durability" which gave the gas an orange glow and silicon activators which both opened and closed computer systems' logic gates and transformed those who inhaled the gas into calcified puppets. (AUDIO: Masterplan) The Eminence called its puppets the Infinite Warriors, using them to expand its dominion to as close a degree to infinity as possible. (AUDIO: Destroy the Infinite)

Development of the Eminence began in an Ides facility years before its war with humanity. Schriver worked single-mindedly to perfect his gas, shirking sleep and losing his sanity to a degree that concerned his assistant, Liv Chenka. Knowing of the devastation that the Eminence would wreak, the Eighth Doctor unsuccessfully convinced Schriver to halt the project. Schriver remained adamant that he was doing the right thing and was prepared to have the Doctor shot to protect his legacy. (AUDIO: Masterplan)

In an alternate timeline created by the Reborn Master and the Dalek Time Controller, Schriver relocated to the Dalek research facility on the Eye of Orion. The Daleks provided him all necessary resources. When a Dalek Supreme and its forces invaded the facility, he transferred his consciousness into the gas. Excited by his newfound omnipotence, he dubbed his compound the Eminence and declared that he had transcended humanity.

Schriver grew enraged when the Time Controller, desperate to escape its impending death, transferred its own consciousness into the Eminence. They fought for dominance, becoming trapped in the Supreme's desired equilibrium. Molly O'Sullivan joined them and used her retro-genitor particles to send them into the Time Vortex. As Schriver and the Time Controller merged into one mind, they voiced their desire to reclaim what was theirs and survive. (AUDIO: Eye of Darkness)

The Eminence bounced between the edges of history before encountering the Orpheus, a ship sent by Ides to explore the universe's outer reaches. The Orpheus siphoned its power in an attempt to get home. It retaliated by possessing the Orpheus's crew one by one, retreating when the Eighth Doctor expelled it from the ship. (AUDIO: Time's Horizon)

The Doctor first fought the Eminence in his fourth incarnation on Delafoss. The Eminence created a ship called the Infinite, which it planned to use to end its war against the Earth Alliance. The Doctor inhaled the breath of forever and was left in command of the Infinite. He used his telepathy to trick the Eminence and destroy the Infinite; it subsequently lost its hold over Delafoss. (AUDIO: Destroy the Infinite)

The Eminence spent decades at war with humanity. The planet Kalsos was on the front lines of the war. After it had expanded to a certain point, the Eminence withdrew its forces, correctly calculating that the subsequent riots would lead to mankind's essential destruction. Shortly after the war had been abandoned, the Sixth Doctor arrived in this time period, where it was revealed that the Eminence still had a connection to him. It believed that it had managed to control him, intending to use him to infect Earth's seed banks and either render the Earth's colonies barren or turn all of its humans into Infinite Warriors. Manipulating the Eminence's perception of its influence over him, the Doctor was able to move the seeds to safety and trap its only available Infinite Warrior inside an empty vault that he set to self destruct. (AUDIO: The Seeds of War)

The Eminence fragment inside the Doctor's mind was poured by the Eighth Doctor, who had travelled to London to investigate the beginnings of the new timeline's Ides, into the console of the Master's TARDIS. The Eminence piloted the TARDIS through the Time Vortex, causing significant damage before the Master expelled it on the suggestion of his companion Sally Armstrong. It was stretched to an infinite length by the Vortex. With a "supreme effort of will", the Master restrained the fragment inside his mind for a future takeover of the Infinite Warriors. (AUDIO: Eyes of the Master, Masterplan)

A thousand Eminence caskets travelled to the Nixyce system, intending to possess all of humanity. The incursion was separately detected by the Daleks (AUDIO: The Traitor) and Time Lords. Predicting a future where the Eminence, not the Daleks, menaced humanity, the Time Lords sent the Reborn Master to steal a casket and prevent its rise. (AUDIO: Eyes of the Master) The Eighth Doctor persuaded the Daleks to destroy the fleet using a superweapon that they had installed on Nixyce VII. The Dalek Time Controller complied after the Doctor agreed to not trigger the bombs that he had helped plant near the superweapon, obliterating the fleet with a powerful shot. (AUDIO: Time's Horizon, Eyes of the Master)

Heron's World lay on the fringes of the war. On one of the Infinite Warriors' raids on Colony Ro 351, Commander Largo killed the father of Leo and Hope Gardner. Months later, the Reborn Master baited the Infinite Warriors into attacking the colony so that he could test how the breath of forever reacted to Molly O'Sullivan's retro-genitor particles. The colonists infused with the particles proved immune to the Eminence's control; Leo, who had refused infusion out of wariness at Molly's presence, fell under the Master's influence instead. (AUDIO: The Death of Hope)

The Eminence visited Ramosa on an invitation from the Reborn Master. Deeming the Ramossans unworthy of its control, it subjected Ramosa to a devastating fire from which the Eighth Doctor speculated that Ramosa would never recover. (AUDIO: The Reviled)

The Reborn Master and Sally Armstrong traveled back to the Eminence's creation to bring it under the Master's command. While Sally visited the Ides facility to ensure that Schriver stayed on task, the Master added ingredients to shipments of the pre-Eminence gas that would make humans who inhaled the breath of forever liable to obey him. The duo faced competition from the Eighth Doctor and Liv, Liv obtaining a position as Schriver's assistant to sway him from his work and the Doctor plotting to explode a ship that the Master was on. The Master caught the Doctor before he could escape the ship, quickly becoming entangled in a game of cat and mouse.

To prevent the ship from crashing onto the planetoid which the Ides facility was built on, the Master released his Eminence fragment. The Eminence decided to kill the Time Lords instead of piloting the ship, necessitating that the Master escape in the Eminence casket that he had trapped Molly in and that the Doctor withstand the crash inside a pressure vessel. (AUDIO: Masterplan)

The Eminence was coaxed into an alliance with the Reborn Master when he showed it a future where it reigned supreme. He suffused all humans on Earth with his mixture of retro-genitor particles and the breath of forever, triggering his influence through the commands of Walter Vincent. The Eminence chafed at the idea of being controlled, but begrudgingly powered the Master's rule.

Curious about the Master's fear of the Doctor, the Eminence entered the Eighth Doctor's mind and learned that the Master would cast it aside. It angrily attacked the Master before the Doctor asked it to return to his mind and Molly to shoot him. Her agitated refusal to kill a friend charged the retro-genitor particles inside Earth's humans, dispersing the Eminence across a large enough area to render it inert. (AUDIO: Rule of the Eminence)

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