Before the Flood

[TARDIS]

(The Doctor is giving us, the viewers, a lecture.)

DOCTOR: So there's this man. He has a time machine. Up and down history he goes, zip zip zip zip zip, getting into scrapes.

(He goes up to the gallery.)

DOCTOR: Another thing he has is a passion for the works of Ludwig van Beethoven.

(Holds up a vinyl LP of Beethoven's 5th.)

DOCTOR: And one day he thinks, what's the point of having a time machine if you don't get to meet your heroes? So off he goes to eighteenth century Germany. But he can't find Beethoven anywhere. No one's heard of him, not even his family have any idea who the time traveller is talking about.

(He swaps the LP for a plaster bust of Ludwig and walks down the stairs.)

DOCTOR: Beethoven literally doesn't exist. This didn't happen, by the way. I've met Beethoven. Nice chap. Very intense. Loved an arm-wrestle. No, this is called the Bootstrap Paradox. Google it. The time traveller panics.

(The bust is put down on a pile of sheet music.)

DOCTOR: He can't bear the thought of a world without the music of Beethoven. Luckily he'd brought all of his Beethoven sheet music for Ludwig to sign. So he copies out all the concertos, and the symphonies and he gets them published. He becomes Beethoven. And history continues with barely a feather ruffled. But my question is this. Who put those notes and phrases together? Who really composed Beethoven's Fifth?

(The Doctor has finished plugging in his electric guitar and plays - da da da dah! da da da dah! And now, back to our drama.)

[Railway station]

(This is a completely fake town, with Russian signs and cardboard cut-out people for target practice. There is no evidence of recent MOD usage. The TARDIS has landed on the fake railway platform, I think.)

DOCTOR: Where's Bennett? We need to get going.
O'DONNELL: Oh, he's still throwing up. One small step for man, one giant bleaurgh.
DOCTOR: Oh, time travel does that sometimes.
O'DONNELL: Somehow I doubt that Rose or Martha or Amy lost their breakfast on their first trip.
DOCTOR: You seem to know an awful lot about me.
O'DONNELL: I used to be in military intelligence. I was demoted for dangling a colleague out of a window.
DOCTOR: In anger?
O'DONNELL: Is there another way to dangle someone out a window? What year are we in?

(The Doctor wets a finger and holds it up.)

DOCTOR: 1980.
O'DONNELL: So, pre-Harold Saxon. Pre-the Minister of War. Pre-the moon exploding and a big bat coming out.
DOCTOR: The Minister of War?
O'DONNELL: Yeah.
DOCTOR: No, never mind. I expect I'll find out soon enough.

(Bennett comes out of the TARDIS and closes the door.)

BENNETT: Sorry about that. Had a prawn sandwich. Might have been off.
DOCTOR: Ah ha. Don't worry. Shall we go?
O'DONNELL: Just one sec, I've just got something in my boot.

(The Doctor walks away. O'Donnell jumps up and down in excitement.)

O'DONNELL: It's bigger on the inside, it's bigger on the inside, it's bigger on the inside. How can it be bigger on the inside, Bennett? (sobers up) Okay, let's roll.

[High Street]

(They catch up with the Doctor, walking past fake shop fronts, a telephone box and a poster of Stalin.)

BENNETT: Why have we gone to Russia?
DOCTOR: Er, we haven't. We're still in Scotland. This is the town before it flooded. The TARDIS has brought us to when the spaceship first touched down. But here and now, it's the height of the Cold War. The military were being trained for offensives on Soviet soil.

(They find the spaceship with its rear ramp down, parked in front of the Orthodox Church.)

[Spaceship]

(They go inside. The missing stasis chamber is in place, and a wrapped mummy is lying on the other one.)

O'DONNELL: Oh, is that the pilot? My God, look at size of it.
DOCTOR: No, that's the body.

(Bennett opens the floor hatch where the two power cells are.)

O'DONNELL: What do you mean, the body?
DOCTOR: This isn't just any spaceship. It's a hearse.
BENNETT: The suspended animation chamber's still here, and the power cells for the engine.
O'DONNELL: And there are no markings on the wall.
DOCTOR: Yet.

[Outside the Church]

(The undertaker runs to meet them as they walk down the ramp, carrying a briefcase and waving a large white handkerchief.)

PRENTIS: Greetings!
O'DONNELL: It's him. That's the ghost from the Drum.

(The alien gets within an inch of the Doctor's nose, as if he is very short-sighted.)

 PRENTIS: Remarkable. Oh, and humans, too.  Albar Prentis, Funeral Director.

(He hands out business cards. Albar Prentis Universal Funeral Director. May the remorse be with you. The Doctor throws his away.)

BENNETT: You're from Tivoli, aren't you?
PRENTIS: The most invaded planet in the galaxy! Our capital city has a sign saying, if you occupied us, you'd be home by now.
DOCTOR: Yes, I've had dealings with your lot before. I can't say I'm a fan.
PRENTIS: No, we do tend to antagonise. (laughs)

(O'Donnell hears a noise and looks away briefly.)

DOCTOR: What are you doing here?
PRENTIS: Ah, yes. Of course. (runs up the ramp) This is the Fisher King. He and his armies invaded Tivoli and enslaved us for ten glorious years! Until we were liberated by the Arcateenians. But, thank the Gods, soon we'd irritated them so much, they enslaved us, too! (laughs)
BENNETT: My first proper alien, and he's an idiot.
PRENTIS: And now, in accordance with Arcateenian custom, I've come to bury him on a barren, savage outpost.
O'DONNELL: You mean the town?
DOCTOR: He means the planet.

(Prentis runs back down the ramp to the Doctor.)

PRENTIS: Although, at the risk of starting a bidding war, you could enslave me. In the ship I have directions to my planet and a selection of items that you can oppress me with.
DOCTOR: Listen, we've come from the future. You're about to send some sort of signal. How do you do it? Is it a special pen?
PRENTIS: What are you talking about?
DOCTOR: The technology you use. The thing that wrenches the soul out of the body and makes it repeat your coordinates for eternity. Give it to me now, I'm going to take the batteries out.
PRENTIS: We don't have anything like that. (laughs) Even this belongs to the glorious Arcateenians.
DOCTOR: So who sends the message?

(Prentis sniffs at the Doctor. They look up at the mummy on the slab.)

DOCTOR: Back to the TARDIS. I need to talk to Clara.

[Mess hall]

(In the future, Cass is sitting observing the ghost Doctor floating just outside. Lunn approaches Clara who is sitting apart.)

LUNN: You've bee here before, in situations like this before.
CLARA: Yeah, not exactly like, but, yeah, once or twice.
LUNN: So you've had to deal with people who are scared. What do you say to them? I'm asking what I should say to you.
CLARA: That it will be all right. That the Doctor will save us.
LUNN: And when you say it, do you believe it?
CLARA: Yeah. Yeah, I do.
LUNN: And now?

(Cass attracts their attention by slapping her chair back.)

LUNN: Cass thinks the Doctor's saying something different to the others. He's saying Moran Pritchard Apprentice. No, Prentis O'Donnell Clara Doctor Bennett Cass
It's a list of all our names and when he finishes, he just goes back to the beginning again, over and over. That's it.
CLARA: Who's Prentis?

(Her mobile phone rings.)

CLARA: It's the Doctor.
LUNN: He's alive?
CLARA: For the moment.

(Lunn signs the good news to Cass.)

CLARA: Doctor? Doctor, are you all right?
DOCTOR [OC]: Yeah, fine. So listen, the spaceship, it's a hearse.

[TARDIS / Mess hall]

(The Doctor on the phone propped up against a mug on a table, Clara on the scanner.)

DOCTOR: Clara, what's wrong?
CLARA: Another ghost has appeared.
DOCTOR: What? Who? Has someone died?
CLARA: Doctor, it's you. Are you okay?
DOCTOR: Yeah. Well, currently.
CLARA: What does it mean?
DOCTOR: It means I die.
CLARA: No, not necessarily. We can change the sequence of events so
DOCTOR: This isn't a potential future. This is the future now.  It's already happened. The proof is right there in front of you. I have to die.
CLARA: No. You can change things.
DOCTOR: I can't. Even the tiniest change, the ramifications could be catastrophic. It could spread carnage and chaos across the universe like ripples on a pond. Oh, well, I've had a good innings. (to O'Donnell) This regeneration, it's a bit of a clerical error anyway. (to Clara) I've got to go sometime.
CLARA: Not with me! Die with whoever comes after me. You do not leave me.
DOCTOR: Clara, I need to talk to you just on your own.

(They pick up their respective handsets.)

DOCTOR: Listen to me. We all have to face death eventually, be it ours or someone else's.
CLARA: I'm not ready yet. I don't want to think about that, not yet.
DOCTOR: I can't change what's already happened. There are rules.
CLARA: So break them. And anyway, you owe me. You've made yourself essential to me. You've given me something else to, to be. And you can't do that and then die. It's not fair.
DOCTOR: Clara.
CLARA: No. Doctor, I don't care about your rules or your bloody survivor's guilt. If you love me in any way, you'll come back. Doctor, are you?
DOCTOR: I can't save Moran or Pritchard.
CLARA: No, but like you said, if you can, if you can find out why this is happening, maybe you can stop them killing anybody else, you can save us. And you can stop it happening to you.
DOCTOR: I'll do what I can, but the future has already happened. We've just met the Undertaker and he's still alive.
(Prentis is making notes in a book as he walks into the spaceship and discovers that the mummy wrappings are empty. He gasps, sniff, then turns and sees the symbols scratched into the bulkhead. A very large shadow looms in the opening to the spaceship. We are treated to an external view of the spaceship and hear a loud roar.
In the TARDIS, the private conversation is over and the Doctor goes back to speaker mode.)
DOCTOR: So. Ghost me. You've got a better view than me. How do I look? Any signs of trauma, any scars? Any clues as to how I die?
CLARA: No, nothing. You're the same as all the other ghosts with the weird black eyes and. No. No, wait. Your coat. It's torn. The right shoulder.

(She holds up the phone to broadcast the image.)

DOCTOR: I assume I'm just saying the same thing as the others.
CLARA: No. You're saying a list of names. Our names, mainly. Moran, Pritchard, Prentis, O'Donnell, Clara, Doctor, Bennett, Cass. Who's Prentis?
DOCTOR: The mole-faced chap.

(Ghost Doctor comes through the window. Clara drops the phone on a table for a moment.)

DOCTOR: What's the matter, Clara, what's happening?
CLARA: You've moved inside. You're inside here now.
DOCTOR: What am I doing?
CLARA: Er, nothing. You're, you're just standing there.
DOCTOR: I'm not trying to kill you? Why am I not trying to kill you?
CLARA: No, wait, you're moving, going toward the control panel.
(The ghost calls up the Faraday cage in sector 4. Status: closed changes to open.)
CLARA: Oh, no. He's opened the Faraday cage. He's let the other ghosts out.
DOCTOR: I need to talk to me now.
CLARA: Didn't you hear me? You opened the Faraday cage. The other ghosts are outside. Shouldn't we be hiding?
DOCTOR: In a minute. I need to talk to the ghost me.

(Clara puts the phone on its long edge, on a cabinet.)

CLARA: Okay, Doctor, you're on.
DOCTOR: Doctor. Such an honour. I've always been a huge admirer. This is really a delight. Finally someone worth talking to. So firstly, why are you here?

(Ghost Doctor turns away.)

DOCTOR: Clara? Clara, what's happening?

(She retrieves her phone.)

CLARA: Er. Er, you, you've just stopped. Oh, no, wait, you've started again.
CASS VIA LUNN: His message has changed. He's saying something different. He's saying
CLARA: What?
DOCTOR: What?
LUNN: What?
CASS VIA LUNN: He's saying, the chamber will open tonight.
DOCTOR: Clara, now the ghosts are out, go to the Faraday cage. They won't be able to get you in there. Oh, there's a problem.
CLARA: Problem? What problem? Oh, really? Because everything else is going so smoothly
DOCTOR: The phone signal won't be able to get through. What you'll have to do, Clara, put the phone outside, and you can watch it through the little round porthole. And when you see it ringing, if it's safe to do so, go out and answer it.
CLARA: Okay, how long are you going to
DOCTOR: Clara, listen to me. Don't let that phone out of your sight. I need to be able to reach you, I need to know everything my ghost does. Do you understand? I'll come back for you. I swear.

(Clara, Cass and Lunn run out.)

[TARDIS]

(Signal lost.)

DOCTOR: Come on. Oh, wait a minute. Not you, O'Donnell.
O'DONNELL: Why not?
DOCTOR: Someone needs to stay here and mind the shop. What if Clara calls?
O'DONNELL: The last bloke that said something like that to me got dangled out of a window.
BENNETT: Maybe the Doctor's right. Maybe it's best if you stay here.
O'DONNELL: Never going to happen. Seriously, have you two met me?

(O'Donnell walks between the men and leaves the TARDIS. Bennett and the Doctor exchange a Look.)

[Spaceship]

(They see the undertaker lying on the bandages and run in.)

DOCTOR: Prentis. Prentis!

(The Doctor checks for a pulse.)

O'DONNELL: Guess that dead body wasn't so dead after all.
BENNETT: And now we've got the writing.
DOCTOR: The Fisher King did it himself. The future is still coming.

[Outside the Church]

(There are drag marks in the soil outside.)

DOCTOR: He's taken the suspended animation chamber to the church.

(There is a big roar.)

O'DONNELL: What was that?
DOCTOR: We need to get back to the TARDIS. Now!

(They run, but a louder roar makes them stop and duck into a narrow passageway.)

[Building]

DOCTOR: It's cut us off.
O'DONNELL: Let's split up. Go on, Bennett.
(She has to dodge around a corner near a tableau of a living room while the Doctor and Bennett make it into a fake bathroom at the end. Bennett jams a chair under the door handle.
Something big is stomping and roaring as it approaches. It passes a broken window in the room where the Doctor and Bennett are hiding. The sounds fade. O'Donnell steps out of her hiding place, and a large shadow is cast over her. She turns. Big roar. Bennett pulls the chair from the door.)
DOCTOR: No, Bennett! Wait!

(Bennett runs to where O'Donnell is lying on the floor, moaning, He kneels and takes her hand, then takes her in his arms.)

BENNETT: Why did you come? You shouldn't have come. I mean, you never listen to anyone. It drives me mad.
O'DONNELL: To keep an eye on you, idiot. So, don't die.
BENNETT: No.

(O'Donnell dies. The Doctor walks up slowly.)

BENNETT: Who's next on the list?

(Bennett lays O'Donnell down, takes off his glasses and stand to face the Doctor.)

BENNETT: That list your ghost was saying, that's the order in which people are going to die, isn't it? I mean, I've only just figured that out. But you knew that all along, didn't you?
Moran, Pritchard, Prentis, O'Donnell.
DOCTOR: I thought perhaps, because her ghost wasn't there in the future, like Prentis's was, I thought maybe, maybe it wouldn't happen. Maybe she stood a chance.
BENNETT: Yeah, but you didn't try very hard to stop her, though, did you? It was almost like you wanted to test your theory. So who's next?
DOCTOR: Clara.
BENNETT: Yeah. Yeah. Except now you're going to do something about it, aren't you? Yeah, because it's getting closer to you. You change history to save yourself but not to save O'Donnell. You wouldn't save her.
DOCTOR: This isn't about saving me. I'm a dead man walking. I'm changing history to save Clara.

(Bennett walks away.)

[Faraday cage]

(Clara is at the door, staring at the phone stood on a ledge opposite. Suddenly a figure appears before her, and she jumps back.)

CLARA: O'Donnell's dead.

(Clara, Cass and Lunn watch ghost O'Donnell turn away.)

CLARA: Oh, no. No, no, no, no, don't you dare. Don't you dare.

(The ghost takes the phone and walks down the corridor.)

[TARDIS]

DOCTOR: Big day for you. Time travel, twice!
BENNETT: Whoa, really? When are we going to?
DOCTOR: Off the map. Out of the rule book. What if I don't die? What if I refuse? I'm going to go back to the base and I'm going to save Clara, because that's what I do. And I don't see anyone here who's going to stop me.

(The Cloister Bell tolls and the TARDIS materialises.)

[Location 512]

(512 is in big numbers on the wall above a paper target of a soldier.)

DOCTOR: Why are we still here?

(Then he sees another TARDIS round the corner, with himself walking out of it.)

DOCTOR: No. No, no, no, no, no.
BENNETT: What?
DOCTOR: We've moved half an hour backwards. I'm locked in my own time stream. The TARDIS won't let me leave.
BENNETT: Well, what do we do?
DOCTOR: Now we have to keep out of sight, until time catches up.

(They walk away.)

LATER DOCTOR: Where's Bennett? We need to get going.
LATER O'DONNELL: Oh, he's still throwing up.

(They see the undertaker taking sextant sightings.)

BENNETT: Prentis. He's alive.
DOCTOR: No, he's just not dead yet. And we don't tell him.
BENNETT: Yeah, but he's right there. I mean, we can just
DOCTOR: No!

(The Doctor pushes Bennett against the wall.)

DOCTOR: However that sentence ends, no, we can't. Save him, and you'll want to save O'Donnell. You can't cheat time. I just tried. You can't just go back and cut off tragedy at the root. Because you find yourself talking to someone you just saw dead on a slab. Because then you really do see ghosts. We don't tell him. Understand? Not a word. We don't have that right. 

[Outside the Church]

(Instead, they hide behind some metal barrels labelled toxic waste and watch the conversation they had in half an hours time.)

LATER PRENTIS: Albar Prentis, Funeral Director.
LATER BENNETT: You're from Tivoli, aren't you?
LATER PRENTIS: The most invaded planet in the galaxy! Our capital city has a sign saying, if you occupied us, you'd be home by now.
LATER DOCTOR: Yes, I've had dealings with your lot before. I can't say I'm a fan.
LATER PRENTIS: No, we do tend to antagonise!

(Later O'Donnell smiles at the Star Wars joke on Prentis's business card. Bennett gets up and the Doctor wrestles him to the ground. O'Donnell hears the thud but sees nothing.)

LATER DOCTOR: What are you doing here?
LATER PRENTIS: Ah, yes. Of course.

[Faraday cage]

CLARA: The dark. The sword. The forsaken. The temple. When we found out what the ghosts were saying, we weren't surprised because the words, they were already inside us.

(Lunn is signing all this for Cass, of course.)

CLARA: But you, you were, weren't you? You didn't know what the words were going to be.
LUNN: Er, no, I didn't. How did you know?
CLARA: Who was the one person who didn't see the writing in the spaceship?
LUNN: Me. Cass wouldn't let me go inside.
CLARA: That's why the ghosts didn't hurt you when they had the chance. The message isn't inside you.
LUNN: Yes, I suppose that makes sense.
CLARA: So you can get the phone back.
LUNN: What?

(Cass queries Lunn.)

LUNN: She's saying I should go and get the phone back.
CASS: No.
CLARA: Listen, listen. I need. We, we need to be able to contact the Doctor and you are the only one who can do this.
LUNN: Okay

(Cass grabs Lunn by the lapels and signs at him very fiercely while Clara checks if the coast is clear.)

LUNN: No, she's right. Neither of you can get it back.

(Cass signs again.)

CLARA: What? What is it? What did she say?
LUNN: It doesn't matter.
CLARA: Please.
LUNN: She said to ask you whether travelling with the Doctor changed you, or were you always happy to put other people's lives at risk.
CLARA: He taught me to do what has to be done. You should get going.

(Clara opens the Faraday cage door.)

[Outside the Church]

(The Doctor and Bennett watch their other selves walk away, and Prentis go into the spaceship. They stand, and the Doctor sees that he has torn his coat in their brief struggle.)

DOCTOR: Oh. I need more time. It's too soon. I haven't saved her yet. Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock, tick tock, tick tock. I've got no choice now, I have to face the Fisher King. You, back to the TARDIS.

[Outside the Faraday cage]

(Lunn sets off down the corridor.)

CLARA: Look, he'll be fine, I promise.

(Cass signs at her, short and angry.)

CLARA: Okay. Didn't need anyone to translate that.

(She rejoins Cass in the cage and closes the door.)

[Outside the Church]

(The Doctor stops outside the Church.)

DOCTOR: Now I'm ready.

[Basement]

(It's not a real church, but an old warehouse or similar with Orthodox Christian crosses on the roof. He goes down a metal staircase to a storage area with metal support posts. The open suspended animation chamber is here.)

DOCTOR: I've come from the future. I've seen the chaos you cause. The bloodshed.
FISHER KING [OC]: Tell me what you have seen.
DOCTOR: Ghosts.
FISHER KING [OC]: Ghosts?
DOCTOR: Souls wrenched from the dead. Repeating directions to here, to this spot, over and over.
FISHER KING [OC]: How many ghosts do I create? How many!
DOCTOR: Four that I know of. Maybe five by now. Probably more since I left.
FISHER KING [OC]: My ghosts will make more ghosts. Enough to bring an armada. Enough to wake me from my sleep.

(Back in the future, the suspended animation chamber in the main hangar suddenly activates. Lunn finds the four ghosts having a conference. They notice him and surround him. Lunn closes his eyes and stands very still as they study him closely. When they stand back, he opens his eyes and walks slowly on.)

(Stomping.)

DOCTOR: What will happen when your people arrive?
FISHER KING [OC]: We will drain the oceans and put the humans in chains.
DOCTOR: This world is protected, by me.
FISHER KING [OC]: Yes. One man, lost in time.

[Mess hall]

(Lunn finds the phone on a table. But when he grabs it and turns to run out.)

COMPUTER: Door emergency security lock.

(The door slams in his face. The ghosts walk past.)

[Basement]

FISHER KING: The seed of their destruction is already sown. They will die. The message will be sent. My people will come, and you will do nothing to stop it, Time Lord.

(We finally see him. About three metres tall, with mandibles and spiky plate armour, and holding a large hand weapon. This giant insectoid is not the Wounded King who guarded the Grail in the legends any more than the Bors we met earlier was the gallant survivor of the Quest.)

[Faraday cage]

(Cass goes to open the door. Clara stops her.)

CLARA: Hey! No, no, no, no. Cass! Wait, what are you doing? Look, Lunn, he is going to be fine, I promise. We have to stay here. I know that look. I do that look. Okay, fine. But we stick together.

(Cass nods, and they leave, Clara closing the door behind them.)

[Basement]

FISHER KING: Time Lords. Cowardly, vain curators who suddenly remembered they had teeth and became the most warlike race in the galaxy. But you, you!

(The Doctor staggers, bent backwards over the open suspended animation chamber.)

FISHER KING: You are curious. You have seen the words, too. I can hear them tick inside you. But you are still locked in your history. Still slavishly protecting Time. Willing to die rather than change a word of the future.

[Intersection]

CLARA: (sotto) Lunn.

(Clara turns right and doesn't notice that Cass has turned left.)

CLARA: (sotto) Lunn. Lunn. (turns round) Oh, Cass. Cass. Cass. Idiot. I'm an idiot.

(Meanwhile, Cass is being followed by Moran, dragging a heavy fire axe. She cannot hear him, of course. but she is wary.)

[Basement]

FISHER KING: You will be a strong beacon. How many ghosts can I make of you?
DOCTOR: You know, you've got a lot in common with the Tivoleans. You'll both do anything to survive. They'll surrender to anyone. You will hijack other people's souls and turn them into electromagnetic projections. That will to endure. That refusal to ever cease. It's extraordinary. And it makes a fella think. Because you know what? If all I have to do to survive is tweak the future a bit, what's stopping me? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. The ripple effect. Maybe it will mean that the universe will be ruled by cats or something, in the future. But the way I see it, even a ghastly future is better than no future at all. You robbed those people of their deaths, made them nothing more than a message in a bottle. You violated something more important than Time. You bent the rules of life and death. So I am putting things straight. Here, now, this is where your story ends.

(The Fisher King growls.)

[Corridor]

(Back in the main hangar, the suspended animation chamber is counting down to opening. Moran is catching up with Cass. A sixth sense makes her squat and place her hand flat on the floor. She feels the vibrations of the scraping axe, stands, turns and runs through Moran as he swings the axe. He vanishes and the axe falls. Cass runs into Clara.)

CLARA: Oh, there you are.

(Cass grabs her hand and they run.)

[Basement]

FISHER KING: There is nothing you can do.

(The Fisher King aims his big energy weapon at the Doctor.)

DOCTOR: I've already done it. The words have gone. I got rid of them. The future I saw, none of that will happen now. The message will never contaminate my friends. No one will die. No one is coming to save you. That's the thing about knowing you're going to die. You've got nothing left to lose.

(The Fisher King pushes the Doctor aside and stomps away.)

[Mess hall]

(Cass and Clara enter.)

LUNN: No, no, you've got to get out of here. The ghosts locked me in. It's a trap.

(The five ghosts all walk through the walls.)

CLARA: Come on. Faraday cage now! 

[Spaceship]

(The Fisher King leaves the Church and stomps into the spaceship. The symbols are still on the bulkhead.)

FISHER KING: The Time Lord lied.

(One of the power cells is missing. It is over by the dam at the back of the town, beeping away its count-down. The Fisher King leaves the spaceship and sees the explosion. He watches cracks form in the dam.)

[TARDIS]

(Bennett is here alone.)

HOLO-DOCTOR: This is security protocol seven one two. The echelon circuit has been activated. Please stow any hand luggage and prepare for departure.

(The TARDIS dematerialises.)

[Main hangar]

(Clara, Lunn and Cass run in to avoid the ghosts.)

CLARA: Back, get back.
(They bump up against the suspended animation chamber, which starts clunking as the four human ghosts enter.
Back in 1980. the dam starts to crumble. The Fisher King continues to just stand there until he realises what is going on and roars. He opens his arms wide and the rush of water carries him off at speed.
In the now, the suspended animation chamber opens and the Doctor sits up, wearing his sonic sunglasses. He takes them off.)
DOCTOR: Don't kiss me. Morning breath.
CLARA: Doctor?

(He leaps out of the chamber.)

DOCTOR: Follow me.

[Bridge]

(The Doctor puts his shades earpiece into a handy socket on a console. The Fisher King's roar is heard.)

CLARA: What's that noise?
DOCTOR: It's the call of the Fisher King. The call of their master.

(The four human ghosts turn around at the sound and walk through a wall.)

CLARA: Where are they going?
(They watch on CCTV as all the ghosts walk into the Faraday cage, where the Doctor ghost is creating the Fisher King roar. The Doctor remotely closes the door and the Doctor ghost flickers out of existence.
Later -)
CLARA: (wearing the sunglasses) So what was it? Your ghost.
DOCTOR: A hologram. Like the one we made of you to lure the ghosts into the Faraday cage. With a soupçon of artificial intelligence, and a few pre-recorded phrases thrown in.

(Clara is about to take the glasses off, but he slaps her hands.)

DOCTOR: Ah!

(Then he removes them.)

DOCTOR: All beamed from the sonic glasses.

(Clara gets up and Cass takes her place. The Doctor puts the glasses on her.)

DOCTOR: As soon as you brought me and the chamber on board, it connected with the base's wi-fi and Bob's your uncle, you've got a ghost Doctor.
CLARA: Why did they only come out at night?
DOCTOR: Because they're electromagnetic projections that were out of phase with the base's day mode. Right.

(He takes his shades off Cass.)

DOCTOR: That's it. I've erased the memory of the writing. Though you might find you've lost a couple of other memories too. You know, like people you went to school with, or previous addresses or how to drink liquids. That's you two done. Where's Bennett?

[Outside the Faraday cage]

(The ghosts are walking about inside, occasionally looking at Bennett.)

BENNETT: What will happen to them?
DOCTOR: UNIT will cut out the Faraday cage with them inside and take it away. Then the space-hearse will be destroyed, so the writing doesn't infect anyone else.
BENNETT: What do I do now?
DOCTOR: I don't understand.
CLARA: I do. You keep going. You have to. Take it from me, there is a whole world out there. A galaxy, a life. What would O'Donnell have wanted?
DOCTOR: I need to erase that message from your mind, but it's fine, I'll do it later.

(The Doctor walks a little way back down the corridor.)

BENNETT: Lunn. Will you translate something to Cass for me?
LUNN: Of course.
BENNETT: Tell her that you're in love with her and that you always have been.
LUNN: What?
BENNETT: Tell her there is no point wasting time because things happen and then it's too late. Tell her I wish someone had given me that advice.

(Cass queries Lunn and he passes on the message. Cass looks quizzically at Bennett.)

LUNN: Oh, God, no. I was just passing on what he said. Please, don't feel

(Cass grabs Lunn and kisses him.)

[TARDIS]

CLARA: What will UNIT do with the ghosts?
DOCTOR: Drag the cage into space, away from the Earth's magnetic field. With nothing to sustain them, the ghosts will eventually fade away.
CLARA: Here's what I don't understand. You did change the future. You stopped the Fisher King from returning.
DOCTOR: The Fisher King had been dead for a hundred and fifty years before we even got here. But once I went back, I became part of events. But here's the thing. The messages my ghost gave, they weren't for you, they were for me. That list. Everyone after you was random, but you being the next name, that's what made me confront the Fisher King.
CLARA: And saying the chamber will open?
DOCTOR: That was me telling me to get inside and when to set it for.
CLARA: Smart.
DOCTOR: Except that's not why I said them.
CLARA: How do you mean?
DOCTOR: I programmed my ghost to say them because that's what my ghost had said. And the only reason I created my ghost hologram in the first place was because I saw it here. I was reverse engineering the narrative.
CLARA: Okay, that's still pretty smart.
DOCTOR: You do not understand. When did I first have those ideas, Clara?
CLARA: Well, it must have been (penny drops) Wow.
DOCTOR: Exactly. Who composed Beethoven's Fifth?

(The Doctor looks at us, shrugs and smiles.)

Transcript originally provided by Chrissie. Adapted by TARDIS.guide. The transcripts are for educational and entertainment purposes only. All other copyrights property of their respective holders.

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