TARDIS Thief

> "*History is going in circles, thief. The steps differ, but the outcome is the same."*
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**TARDIS Thief** is the sixth serial of the Thieves and TARDISes campaign, notable for being the first co-GMed adventure.

### Summary

#### Part One

> *The imperial trial of the Time Lord Romanadvoratrelundar will now commence.*
> *(Something is very wrong.)*
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#### Part Two

> *Time for a change in scenery - and a change in character sheets. In a strange deserted temple somewhere on Mars, the Doctor and their assorted friends attempt to puzzle out the truth of matters.*
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#### Part Three

> *Team TARDIS finds themselves neck-deep in a close-to-home civil war and on a mission to destroy the Imperiatrix herself - accompanied by a a very familiar friend.*
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#### Part Four

> *The goal is simple: Pandora must die. Leela has a knife. Brax has a plan.*
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#### Part Five

> *The team are flung into a new, unexpected reality - an auction, with two familiar faces. The Doctor has a bidding war. Leela has a sword. Dissent has a mission.*
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#### Part Six

> *In which consequences catch up to everyone, and the Doctor finally finds her wife. Sort of.*
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#### Part Seven

> *Warning: graphic depictions of gardening.*
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### NPCs

* Andred
* Inquisitor Darkel
* Roman
* Maxil
* Ace McShane
* Narvin
* Irving Braxiatel
* Torkath
* TRUE REALITY
* Pandora
* K9
* Joseph
* Auctioneer
* Father Sanjira
* Hydra
* Dix-Sept
* Bernice Summerfield
* Baise
* The TARDIS
* Midnight

### Continuity

#### Act One

* Leela is delighted to see Andred again, remarking that he's 'finally come home' after his disappearance in season one of Gallifrey.
* Darkel reprises her role as Madame Inquisitor for the court, as seen in *Trial of a Time Lord*. Maxil appears to take the role of the Valeyard, as the prosecution for the case against Roman.
	+ Roman had previously shot Maxil, causing him to regenerate - even though these events don't seem to have occurred in this version of reality, there is still obvious animosity between the two of them.
* Leela recognizes Roman's coat as the one she'd obtained from the Heartshaven vault in Family Matters.
* Roman and Dissent steal the De-mat Gun together - previously seen in *Invasion of Time.*
* The Doctor recognizes Roman from their shared history, and references several events from his appearances in the Game of Rassilon, including Riley!Doctor's Big Plan.
	+ She brings up Roman's death from *Family* as a major point of her defence against his execution. She also (incorrectly) cites the First Law of Time.
	+ Roman mentions how much his TARDIS hates him.
* Roman's emotional support cat is named after an old friend, Travis Killian.
* The Doctor finds it strange that the Matrix is still operational on Gallifrey - which is fair enough, seeing as she *did* destroy large parts of it by releasing the Time Lord consciousnesses contained within several lifetimes ago.
* Roman remarks that the Doctor hasn't been a lawyer in a long time, referencing **this theory**.
* Dissent still has Secret Knives.
* Leela knows her way around the Capitol's secret passages.

#### Act Two

* The Doctor, as their seventh incarnation, plays the spoon and briefly remarks on the strangeness of their accent.
* Leela recognizes the Seventh Doctor from their previous encounter in *Dimensions In Time*.
* Ace remarks that the Doctor never explains what's going on, and suggests Nitro-Nine as a solution to the sliding-tile puzzle.
* The melody that plays in the windchime room is a shorter version of the Doctor Who theme, and is referred to as 'Fitz's song of time', referencing **this theory**.
* Kitty references the infamous cliffhanger scene from *Dragonfire* while the Doctor is hanging off a ledge in the puzzle room.

#### Act Three

* Pandora, the Imperiatrix and the Free Time movement are all mentioned by Narvin during the briefing.
* Narvin is no longer the Co-ordinator of the Celestial Intervention Agency.
* Brax's new Collection is located at the Axis.
* Narvin and Braxiatel briefly discuss travelling to Gryben.
* Braxiatel passed her TARDIS driving test on the first try. The Doctor did not. This is apparently a sore point for her.
* Leela is familiar with the Outsiders, having spent some time with them prior to the events of Gallifrey. She also mentions her familiarity with the secret passages of the Capitol.
* The Braxiatel of this reality does not remember the events of Family Matters, and hasn't been to the Esoterica since she moved her possessions to the new Collection.
* Pandora's office has retained the lead-lining that the Fourth Doctor added to the walls to prevent psychic interference during *The Invasion of Time*.
* Joseph the Porter, from the Bernice Summerfield spinoffs, makes a brief appearance.

#### Act Four

* The TARDIS is once again mistaken for a piece of modern art.
* Father Sanjira was first seen in the EDA 'Alien Bodies', where he committed paradox-suicide after failing a Faction mission. Here, he appears as the mentor of this reality's Dissent.
* The Doctor references their inconsistent characterization from the Virgin New Adventures. Benny similarly comments on 'those amnesia incidents'.
* Benny mentions that she's currently not affiliated with the Collection, and confirms that her version of Braxiatel is most likely a Miles Richardson he/him incarnation.
* In response to Kitty jokingly asking if Leela has eyes, Rain briefly references the events of later Gallifrey seasons, in which... Leela does not have eyes. Ouch. Oof. Too soon.
* Benny mentions her son, Peter.
* The Doctor finally finds out what Brax and the party did to Theseus in Family Matters.

#### Act Five

* The Midnight Entity in the form of Sky Silvestry (here referred to as just 'Midnight') was last seen in the Tenth Doctor episode, *Midnight,* where it was sucked out onto the planet Midnight's surface and seemingly vaporized. Apparently, it survived.
	+ The Doctor recognizes the initial location of the final act as the planet Midnight in altered form.

### Trivia

* This serial is divided up into acts - presumably one for each time the team shifts realities.
	+ Act One: Iuditium Roma
	+ Act Two: Melody of the Maze
	+ Act Three: Pandora's Box
	+ Act Four: Lot 17
	+ Act Five: Midnight
* Both Roman's theme and Expert Testimony include riffs/thematic elements taken from the scoring of the Game of Rassilon.
* The windchime puzzle in Act 2 was played out in real time via the Online Multiplayer Piano, although the original recording of that was lost and later recreated for the audio edit of the episode.
	+ The sliding tile puzzle was similarly played out in real time through a online platform. Screenshots of the various states of that game are linked on the transcript.

* TRUEREALITY's appearance at the end of Part Three was accompanied by a mysterious account by the same name appearing in the Discord server where T&T is recorded. TRUEREALITY has been sending intermittent ominous in-character messages ever since, apparently bridging the gap between in-character and out-of-character. In the transcripts and in the audio, this is translated as closely as possible with text-to-speech renditions of TRUEREALITY's messages.
* The Gallifrey of the T&T universe(s) has rings, as proposed by Ray, referencing **this article**.
* Braxiatel's new Collection strongly resembles the artwork 'Double Planetoid' by MC Escher.
* The 'house-sized spider sculpture' mentioned in Part 5 is most likely one of Louise Bourgeois's.
* Midnight's theme takes heavy inspiration and the direct melody line from Ella Fitzgerald's performance of 'Round Midnight', originally by Theloneous Monk.
* The humanoid form of the TARDIS directly resembles **this art** that Kitty had drawn of her several weeks prior to the final act.
* At seven parts total, *TARDIS Thief* is the longest serial of T&T to date.

The trial begins. Art by Kitty.Various Act One doodles. Art by Kitty.Screenshot of the tile puzzle from Act 2. Art by Rain.