B00DPX9ST8 EBOK (294 page)

Causing further complications,
Love and War
is definitely set after
Frontier in Space
[2540]. In subsequent books there was confusion, with some novels claiming that Benny does indeed come from the “twenty-sixth century” (e.g.
Transit
p186;
Blood Heat
p3).

Latterly, so as not to contradict the television series, it has been decided that Benny is definitely from the twenty-sixth century. Benny explained that there are a number of calendars in use in the cosmopolitan galaxy of her time, and in our terms she is “from the late-twenty-sixth century” (
Just War,
p136) - this is intended to explain away some of the contradictions. Paul Cornell and Jim Sangster have astrologically determined Benny’s birthday as 21st June, a date that first appeared in
Just War
(p135) and now appears on the Big Finish official biography on their website. Even so, she celebrates on 20th November in
The Dimension Riders
.

The few Benny solo adventures that reference her birth year tend to work from a dating of 2540, or reasonably close to it. She’s 22 in
Benny: Old Friends:
“The Ship of Painted Shadows” (set in 2562), and the 2562 component of
Benny: The Sword of Forever
. In
Benny: The Adventure of the Diogenes Damsel
, Benny says that she was born “six hundred forty-seven years” after 1893 - so, again, she was born in 2540.
Benny: The Vampire Curse
: “Predating the Predators”, which ends on “Saturday 24 June 2609”, goes out of its way to reiterate Benny’s birth as 21st June, 2540. (Benny, page 215: “If we go by the calendar and ignore the time-travel, I should be 68. Actually, hell - Wednesday would have been my 69th birthday. I must have been too wrapped up in trivialities like not getting myself killed to notice.”)
Benny: Genius Loci
seems to make an honest mistake - the story occurs in 2561, but Benny has a birthday in the midst of it, so she should be 20 when she arrives on Jaiwan, and yet she’s already 21 (p6). A bigger disparity is that
Benny: The Wake
(which ends in early 2608) has Benny telling Peter that she was born “seventy-one years ago” - which, even if she’s not counting her upcoming birthday, at best adds up to 2538.

[
740
] The ceasefire was declared “fifty years” before
Demontage
(p4).

[
741
]
The Well-Mannered War
(p272). Stokes is from the 2400s, so the official records must have been altered to due to his relocation to the twenty-sixth century.

[
742
]
Conundrum

[
743
]
Benny: Another Girl, Another Planet

[
744
] Dating “Fugitive” (IDW Vol. 1 #3-6) - It is “many centuries” since the time of the 15th Draconian Emperor, and the Draconians and Ogrons in this story date from relatively soon after
Frontier in Space
.

[
745
] A generation or so before
The Also People.

[
746
] “Two hundred years” after
Valhalla
.

[
747
]
So Vile a Sin
(p211).

[
748
] “Three hundred years” before
Dark Progeny
. They are in use in
Frontier in Space.

[
749
] “Six or seven years” before “Dreamers of Death”.

[
750
]
Death and Diplomacy
(p124). We might infer from other stories that the first wave was in the mid-twenty-second century (seen in
The Dalek Invasion of Earth
) which was targeted on Earth’s solar system, and the second led to the Dalek War mentioned in
The Crystal Bucephalus
and
The Colony of Lies
.

The Dalek Wars

In
Death to the Daleks
, Hamilton states “My father was killed in the last Dalek War”, implying there was more than one. We know from other Dalek stories that humanity and the Daleks come into conflict throughout history, starting with
The Dalek Invasion of Earth
[around 2157]. However, there are almost certainly no Dalek Wars affecting Earth directly between
To the Death
and
The Rescue
[c 2190-2493], as Vicki has only heard of the Daleks from history books discussing the Invasion (she doesn’t even know what they look like). According to Cory in
Mission to the Unknown
, the Daleks have been inactive as a military force in Earth’s sphere of influence for a millennium before
The Daleks’ Master Plan
[between 3000-4000 AD]. In
Planet of the Daleks
, the Doctor uses the term “Dalek War” to describe the events of
The Daleks
, which did not involve humanity.

According to
The Terrestrial Index,
there are a string of Human/Dalek conflicts, the First to Fourth Dalek Wars. The First was the Dalek Invasion of Earth; the Second was fought by “the Alliance” of Humans, Draconians and Thals in the twenty-fifth century; the Third was again fought by the Alliance after the events of
Frontier in Space
and
Planet of the Daleks
; the Fourth was
The Daleks’ Master Plan
.

This is a numbering system that is never used on television, and some of the details of Lofficier’s account actively contradict what we’re told in the stories - at the time he proposes a “Second Dalek War” involving the Thals and Draconians, the Thals don’t have advanced space travel and a century later, they think that humans are a myth (
Planet of the Daleks
). The first contact between humanity and the Draconians was in 2520 (in the twenty-
sixth
century), leading to a short war, followed by twenty years of hostility and mutual mistrust (
Frontier in Space
).

The books have established that Dalek Wars took place in Benny’s native time. She’s born the same year
Frontier in Space
and
Planet of the Daleks
are set [q.v. Benny’s birthday]. her father fights in the Dalek wars and her mother is killed in a Dalek attack. What’s more, Ace spends three years fighting Daleks in this time period between
Love and War
and
Deceit
. As such, there is a mass of information about the Wars in many of the novels. There’s no mention of a lull in the fighting - war presumably breaks out soon after
Frontier in Space
, it carries on into Benny’s childhood and apparently into her early adulthood. Humanity is still fighting the Daleks when Benny hits thirty (
Love and War
), but they’ve defeated the Daleks within three years of that (
Deceit
). Nevertheless, according to
Lucifer Rising
, there are two distinct Dalek Wars at this time - Benny’s father fought in the Second Dalek War (p65), whereas Ace fought in the Third (p309), so there must be a short-lived cessation of hostilities (which would seem to be at some point in the 2560s, when Benny is in her twenties).

A lengthy essay at the end of
Deceit
has the Dalek War starting after
Frontier in Space
and Ace fighting in the Second Dalek War.

Some stories (for example,
The Crystal Bucephalus
) stick to Lofficier’s scheme.

So... the term “Second Dalek War” is used to refer to two or possibly even three different conflicts in both the twenty-fifth and twenty-sixth centuries (and this is further complicated because of the early confusion over which century Benny was born in). For the sake of clarity, references to the numbering of the Dalek Wars have been left out of the timeline itself; where they are given in a story, it’s been footnoted.

Within the fiction, it’s fairly easy to rationalise the discrepancy: these are the naming conventions of historians, and different historians will have different perspectives on the various conflicts and labels for them.

[
751
]
Deceit

[
752
]
Benny: Beige Planet Mars
. The “offworlders” are the apocryphal forty-second Doctor (as “played” by Ian Richardson) and his companion, Iphigenia “Iffy” Birmingham. Both feature in 90s fan-fic stories by Lance Parkin and Mark Clapham.

[
753
]
Benny: The Sword of Forever

[
754
]
Benny: Nobody’s Children

[
755
]
Benny: The Diet of Worms

[
756
] Dating
Benny: Buried Treasures:
“Closure” (Benny audio #1.5b) - It’s “fifty years” before the “modern-day” component of “Closure”. It’s not said whether Benny’s actions actually change history or not.

[
757
] Dating
Return of the Living Dad
(NA #53) - This happens “forty” years before 2587 (p7), Benny would have been “seven” at the time (p12). Although the date is given as “2543” (p29), there is some confusion over Benny’s birthday in the NAs, and this is a victim of that. This is “the height of the Second Dalek War” (q.v. The Dalek Wars).

[
758
] A number of references to Benny Summerfield’s early life appeared in the New Adventures, and these were not always consistent. In
Love and War
(p75), Benny’s birthplace is identified as “Beta Caprisis. Earth colony” - supporting that, in
Benny: The Wake
, Benny points at a star and tells Peter, “That’s Beta Caprisis... that’s where your mummy was born.” But, in
Sanctuary,
Benny recalls that her mother was killed on a raid on “Vandor Prime, in the Gamma Delphinus system” (p185). We might speculate that she was born on the former and moved to the latter. As pointed out in
Set Piece
(p132), there is some confusion about the exact sequence of events during the raid that killed Benny’s mother. Accounts also vary as to whether Benny’s father disappeared before or after her mother’s death. Benny was only seven when all this happened, so she is almost certainly misremembering some details or blocking out some of her unpleasant memories.

[
759
] “Emperor of the Daleks”

[
760
] Dating “Pureblood” (
DWM
#193-196) - It’s “the twenty-sixth century” in part one, but “the twenty-fifth” in part two. It seems to be around Benny’s native time, as she’s heard of the Lauren Corporation. The Second Dalek War is mentioned, but that’s not as helpful a reference as one might think (q.v. “The Dalek Wars”). The Doctor says the Sontarans will not be a threat to Earth again until
The Sontaran Experiment
(which, as far as we know, they aren’t).
Sontarans: Conduct Unbecoming
names Sontar as the Sontaran homeworld (perhaps it was founded after Sontara’s destruction).

[
761
] Dating “Dreamers of Death” (
DWM
#47-48) - The year isn’t specified in the story, but there’s a reference to Unicepter dream machines being “recently banned” in the
Abslom Daak - Dalek Killer
collected edition, placing the story around then. The settlers on Unicepter IV are “human”. Their technology is not terribly advanced - they have hover cars and energy weapons, thinking projectile weapons are “old fashioned”.

[
762
] “Star Beast II”

[
763
] Abslom Daak first appeared in Marvel’s
Doctor Who Weekly
#17, and has returned a number of times since. He was mentioned in
Love and War
(p46-47 - we also meet Maire, another DK, in that novel), before appearing in the (cloned) flesh in
Deceit
.