Alternative Reality was also disturbing to a lot of readers, proving that the idea of an evil Time Lord and a good Daleks really WAS an unwelcome suggestion from the American fan who was obsessed with that idea. Beloved Enemy, with the sympathetic Dalek went down VERY well. The same can be said of the TV episode, Dalek, which had Rose forming a brief understanding with the one trapped by Van Staten. But an evil Doctor was hard to take. It felt wrong when I was writing it. the very idea that The Doctor could have murdered Davie and his father, just felt horrible. But in a way, that WAS the intention. That feeling that this alternative universe was SO wrong was EXACTLY the effect I was trying to achieve.

Ultimately, though, I couldn’t let it stay like that. Davie and his alternative universe brother find out, AFTER they have fought and killed the monster Doctor that he was actually not acting to his true nature. He was being controlled by miniaturised cybermats that had been in his bloodstream since before he and Rose were married, slowly changing him from the good guy to the megalomaniac that was left. And Davie realised that, not only has he found a way of saving that universe, by going back and killing the things when The Doctor was first infected, but he has to do the same in his OWN universe so that his own life won’t turn out that way. It gets complicated there, but finally, Davie gets home to his own world with everything right again.

The night that Davie spent cuddled up with his alternative universe brother was obviously meant to represent the only example of Human love and comfort in the comfortless universe. And most readers got that. If the email feedback is typical, though, it has also had the effect of confirming the twins as gay icons, along with Chrístõ in the Theta Sigma stories. They are loved for rising above the usual perceived behaviour and showing brotherly affection to each other, as exemplified in this story. And that’s ok. That’s perfectly fine. Neither of them ARE gay, but they ARE gentle souls who, if they attract that sort of adoration it is perfectly fine.