Limehouse Lurker The Limehouse Lurker was the name given by the London press to a Cyber - Leader than went rogue after it was hit by a bomb , leading it to commit a series of hideous murder s around the East End . It was also given the name of the East End Fiend . Some considered the Lurker to be the new Jack the Ripper . Biography . Arriving on Earth . The Cyber - Leader that became the Limehouse Lurker was originally from the 30th century . It led a force of Cybermen back in time to Earth in 1939 and they landed in Jersey . They set up operations in the Le Mur Engineering compound , preparing for an invasion , but they were interrupted by the outbreak of World War II and the German occupation of the Channel Islands . The Cyber - Leader , along some other Cybermen and the Cyber command unit , fled to mainland Britain . the Lurker . When the Blitz began in 1940 , the Cyber - Leader was hit by a Luftwaffe bomb , severing its ability to communicate with the other Cybermen and destroying its memory banks . The damage to its casing also made the sterile fluid interface between its organic and mechanical parts vulnerable to assault from bacteria and Earth virus es . It began to burn up inside and went on a frenzied search for a replacement fluid , the best option on Earth in 1940 being blood . Meanwhile , Wall took charge of the Cyberman operations . The Lurker , as it became known in the newspaper s , began murdering people by tearing them apart down the middle but later it found a more efficient method by using the remains of victims blown apart by the command unit that was still programmed to follow its leader . One victim torn apart was a homeless man Josh . The Lurker bathed itself in the blood of the victims which temporarily subdued the fire within it . In November 1940 , Chief Inspector Patrick Mullen , Constable Quick and the Seventh Doctor investigated the Lurker ' s trail , questioning Dr Rush Walsh about blood stored at a central collection point where it seemed likely the Lurker would strike . However , George Limb lured the Lurker into his house with bags of blood from the collection centre and locked it in his guest room . The Doctor ' s companion Ace was later attacked by the Lurker but Captain Hartmann arrived and fought it to the ground with a cattle prod . Salvage . Afterwards , the Doctor and Limb were able to study the inert Lurker in Limb ' s cellar . Keeping the Lurker active with a Hornby train set battery , the Doctor was able to recover some of its memories and learn more about the Cyberman invasion plans . The Lurker soon overloaded and was destroyed . The Doctor salvaged its head . Major Lazonby confiscated the head when he caught the Doctor sneaking around the Peddler Electronic Engineering factory . Unbeknownst to the Major , the head was moved into the factory chamber where Cyber - conversion was taking place and attached to the console . When a battle broke out , the Doctor snatched the head away again and later used it to lure the Cyber command unit to him . Another Cyber - Leader was part of the sleeper force left in Jersey . It was the first to be revived but it was quickly destroyed when a battle with the Nazi s broke out in the compound . ( PROSE : " Illegal Alien " )