Previously on the Hordes of Doggerland

Episode Four - The Story So Far

Previously on TGCC; Tales of the Laski.

Midna – 20,000 ahead

Elia, an Entah archaeologist, discovers a TARDIS-like chamber in the flooded core of Midna. She communicates with La’teen and Laski up in the Z-Core but becomes trapped as the lifting platform becomes wedged in the subterranean waters. In the chamber Elia is met by a humanoid hologram, who reveals that Entaria was in fact part of six worlds once, but that the others were destroyed in the Time War. She also discovers that Midna served as a military storage facility during the War and was once used to store Gallifreyan weapons. Meanwhile Cell, a terrorist organisation hell-bent on dethroning the Entah royal family, blackmails La’teen into giving up Laski by torturing Commander Z’Tole, the founder of the Z-Core. La’teen refuses to give Laski up and orders the soldiers at her command to locate the Cell ship in orbit. Elsewhere back in the chamber underground, Elia radios to Laski her discoveries. The hologram reveals that Midna is not a ‘real’ world, leading Elia to suspect that it might be a TARDIS. Laski disputes this claim, but instead suggests that perhaps a long time ago Midna could have been a TARDIS. With this in mind, he begins a similar tale of something which happened to him twenty-thousand-years prior.  

Doggerland – Blood and Water

After P90’s death in the early hours of Bastille Day, the Cantina crew all disbanded on bad terms. Mapp was blamed for P90’s death and Susie bitterly returned to the twenty-first century to have her baby and become a single parent, whereas Dray set up a base of operations in 1789 Paris to protect the Earth without need for Mapp’s assistance. CJ and Dray defended the world from various alien threats in the meantime. Together they formed the ‘Cantina Initiative’ which comprises of most living Cantina members. Dray meanwhile, in private, still worked to discover the origin of the mysterious artefact known only as the Ark, which the Jester claimed could counter ‘The Great End’. Susie on the other hand had returned to England, but became haunted by dreams of P90 who pleaded with her to return to the catacombs of Paris to ‘free’ his TARDIS, which had been abandoned there after the burial. On her journey to Calais however the ferry Susie was travelling on was caught up in a terrible maelstrom. Strange creatures from the storm boarded and pulled her down under the water. The ferry was sunk.

Days later, Susie awoke in a city under the sea, chained to a table, surrounded by surgeons. They were performing a C-Section and she witnessed their leader, Nurse Bathory, abduct her newborn. Susie was then dumped in the ruined streets where she swore to get her revenge, but first she needed to get to know her new environment. CJ, who had also been abducted from the surface, got into contact telepathically and guided Susie through the ruins of Doggerland. Susie eventually reunited with CJ and Laski where they explained the situation. Laski revealed that Doggerland is ruled by a terrible foursome called the League of Iron, comprised of Joseph Koch, Prof. Valculga, One-Shoe Sammi and Nurse Bathory, who each dominate their own section of the city. CJ explains that the League, in turn, is ruled by a mysterious figure known as the Countess. Susie vows to find Bathory and reclaim her baby, just as Elle (a strange woman who has appeared throughout all of Susie’s recent adventures) appears and promises to help. Meanwhile up in Celestial Heights (Koch’s section of Doggerland), Koch shows off his latest experiment – Subject 12 – a man who has been fused with all of the abilities of the known Cantina members. Through a surreal dream sequence it is revealed that the man is actually Anton, who helped the Cantina crew fight the Jester in the build up to Bastille Day, although how he arrived in the 21st century is unknown. He dreams of Cammi and Edward, the family he had in England after escaping France.

Elle and Susie (and Laski) head down to Shades Alley in an attempt to reach the back entrance to the Bathory Courts whereas CJ heads down towards the Vertigo Core in order to send a message to Dray (who lives in a time ship underneath modern Paris).  Susie and Elle split up, leaving Susie alone to creep through Shades Alley. She reaches an arena and watches as King, the leader of Shades Alley, executes One-Shoe Sammi in front of his followers. Susie follows him to his lair and observes a meeting between King and two people from the city above, who are apparently working for Koch. When the two leave, King spots Susie and – strangely – lets her leave unharmed. He even directs her towards the Bathory Courts. Susie threatens him them continues on her way. Meanwhile up in Celestial Heights, Valculga uses the confusion of One-Shoe’s death to his advantage. He leads an assault on Koch’s section, killing Koch in the process. With two members of the League down, this leaves Valculga and Bathory in charge of Doggerland. But whispers of the Countess arise from the streets, creating paranoia between the two.

Elsewhere down in the flooded Constantine Wharfs, CJ discovers a fifth member of the League hiding in the ruins. He reveals himself as Finchy, who was cast out by his colleagues for attempting a coup against the Countess. Finchy has been presumed dead up until then. He makes a deal with CJ that after she has reached the Vertigo Core she should blow up the old generators down there to finish off Valculga’s army of mutants. He explains that the generators no longer power Doggerland, which draws all of its power now from the maelstrom on the surface. CJ agrees, seeing how it will benefit her, and continues her to journey to the Core. Once there she sends a message to Dray in Paris.
Dray receives the vague message and, after a communication with Myn (who is far out in the universe working for the Cantina Initiative), searches through her various files. There she uncovers the true history of Doggerland, which was built as a Cold War retreat in case Russia and America ever went to war. Although other similar sites were unveiled throughout the nineties, Dray discovers that Doggerland was kept secret because the city was put together using alien technology. The revelation of this could break any alliances Great Britain has with the other countries on the surface. She vows to find CJ. Back in Doggerland CJ faces off against an Iron Angel, based on the ‘Boris’ robot she faced on the Chronos during a dramatic night shift aboard the Cantina one time, and realises that the Countess (who designed the Iron Angels) must come from the same dark future, of the Triangle and an evil figure called the Empress. CJ defeats the robot, reclaims Kazumi (which had been missing for some time) and then heads down towards the generators, where she sets up Finchy’s explosive charge. The Iron Angel returns, preventing her escape.

Up in Shades Alley and Susie learns from spying on a conversation that the Countess can disguise herself as virtually anyone. She then witnesses a horde of locust-like creatures attack the inmates, leading to an all-out battle on the platform. Susie reunites with Elle, who explains that King was the one who originally formed the League of Iron, and together the two head towards the Bathory Courts. Once there Susie faces the surgeons who violated upon her arrival in the city, killing one of them and scaring off the others, and she and Elle then move towards Bathory’s office. Susie finally kills Bathory as Elle saves the baby, but then Elle reveals herself to be the Countess in disguise. She stabs Susie.

In Celestial Heights Valculga receives a message from Koch, alive and well, from the Bathory Courts. Valculga’s mutants recognise Koch as their creator and kill Valculga for his betrayal, returning Celestial Height to Koch’s command.

After an unknown amount of hours, Laski awakens in a mine. He decides that the reason Susie is not dead is because the Countess’s dagger hit him instead, as he was in Susie’s breast pocket at the time. He seems to be in control of Susie’s mind and, using a version of her body, begins to explore this new place. He escapes the mine with various other miners and figures out that he cannot interact with them, meaning that this place must be a dream or a memory. He opts for the latter, but whose memory? Laski reaches a small underground village and decides that this place is not Doggerland but somewhere else. He watches two young girls play near the rocky homesteads, one of whom he recognises as a very young Elle. The other is called Aila, who also seems familiar. The memory seems to flash-forward, back to the mining tunnels, where Elle and Aila reveal themselves to have formed a romantic relationship. Laski learns that Elle and Aila inhabit a time where an empire called the Triangle rules the galaxy, where Earth and various other worlds have been destroyed. Spying on them in their memory, Laski waits to discover more.