The Orphans of Uanh was inspired by a story I read something like thirty-five years ago in one of the comics I used to read back then – Judy, Mandy, Jinty or Bunty. In that story, a girl was disturbed in the night by a shooting star and went out of her house to look at it. She then went back to bed and woke up the next morning to find she had a little sister she didn’t remember at all, even though everyone else did. In the end, it turned out that the little sister was an alien planted on Earth for evil means.
I wanted to do something that captured the same idea for some time. There was a variation of it in Theta Sigma when Chrístõ found himself with a little sister for a short time. But this story is much closer to the original idea.
The opening scene, with Davie sitting on the veranda drinking a glass of single malt in the cool evening was deliberately meant to put across how much of a grown adult he is now. Davie and his brother were first introduced as eight year olds, and in the course of five years of stories they’ve grown to their early twenties. But I know a lot of readers still think of them as little boys. Davie’s wedding to Brenda is the final part of the transition from teenage apprentice Time Lords to adulthood and responsibility, and this scene, in which he drinks alcohol and talks to his now pregnant wife, underpins that transition.
Davie, of course, is immune to the reality alterations that allow Brenda to suddenly have a kid brother. His immediate reaction is to worry about his own sanity. But most of that is, it has to be admitted, padding to stretch out the mystery a bit.
The meteorite that isn’t a meteorite is slightly inspired by a source even older than my Bunty story, the plastic-like pods that come down from space in Jon Pertwee’s first Doctor Who story, Spearhead from Space. In one scene, The Doctor looked at pieces of a pod and concluded immediately that they were part of a hollow sphere. Davie, every much the scientist as his great-grandfather, comes to the same conclusion.
Why photographs on film when digital must be standard
in the 24th century? Because, of course, film should be immutable. They
are the proof to Davie that it is reality that is wrong, not his own head.
And 
along
with the plastic space pods they give him the explanation he needs.
Now, in the Bunty story the alien intention was malignant.
It was a variation of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, getting a foothold
on Earth. But the Androids who are seeking to find homes for the children
of Uanh are different. They simply want to do some good. The idea that
the people of Uanh wiped themselves out except for their children is a
bit implausible, but I think it just about works as a plot device. Anyway,
it allows Davie to be magnanimous about his discovery. After all, he is
the Lord of Time calling all the shots, now. He can decide what can be
allowed and what can’t.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bunty
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandy_%28comic%29
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jinty_%28comics%29
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tammy_%28comics%29
