In a hotel, a woman, Winnie O’Connor, is talking to someone called ‘Sandy’, commenting that ‘Sandy’ looks tired. It’s been cold outside, and something is very wrong. She claims to have heard the strangest noise, perhaps a spring breaking or a cog lost. She instructs ‘Sandy’ to put her ear against it while she rings for a cup of tea. O’Connor gets up and prepares to instigate an act of aggression before hearing a knock at her door. A young man arrives to take away the leftovers from the woman’s dinner. She hands the man her dishes and he asks about her wellbeing. The man asks whether or not O’Connor had a knife with her dinner, only problem is that he can’t find it, as the woman can’t reasonably eat gammon without one. O’Connor sweetly agrees with him, but soon drops her accent from an upper-class accent to a South London accent, asking what the man is looking at and demands that he leaves. The boy mentions that he’s seen the woman and he could know her again. O’Connor dismisses the man and he leaves. Once the man leaves, the woman curses him under her breath. O’Connor becomes annoyed and tells ‘Sandy’ that she won’t go through with it, claiming it’ll break her mother’s heart. She plans to leave and that ‘Sandy’ will respect her wishes. Footsteps approach her room and she panics, whispering that it’s him. The door opens, and she happily greets the visitor – ‘Sandy’.
Jago awakens with a start, proclaiming the name Abigail. Litefoot is nearby, but Jago can barely see him due to the darkness in the carriage. Jago suggests that Litefoot should light a match, Litefoot does so. Jago asks where they are, Litefoot confirms that they are on a train that has stopped. Jago is sure that he felt the train crash. He suggests that they find the other passengers in case they are hurt. But Litefoot asks an important question: Where are the other passengers? The train is completely devoid of sound, suggesting the two maybe alone on the train. But Jago can feel vibrations on the windows. Jago asks Litefoot a rather strange question, did Litefoot apply perfume to himself before they left earlier that day, possibly a lady’s perfume? Litefoot assures Jago that only a bar of soap as touched his skin. He asks only because when he awoke moments ago, he smelt something strange. Litefoot suddenly smells the odour, as well as hears a shuffling noise within the carriage – like the swish of a skirt. The two realise that they are not alone in the carriage and Litefoot can hear faint breathing. He warns the stranger that he is well aware of their presence. Jago urges Litefoot to light another match, as soon as he does so, a woman’s scream echoes through the carriage… The gaslights in the carriage turn back on, but there is no sign of the woman. Litefoot theories the woman couldn’t get back into the carriage unnoticed without being seen. At Jago’s behest, Litefoot leaves out the possibility of the woman being a ghost and decide to investigate further…
Meanwhile, the visitor ‘Sandy’ tells O’Connor in a faux cockney accent I know what you done. ‘Sandy’ reveals that the woman used the aforementioned missing knife to attack a gentleman on the floor above, only thing is the gentleman and ‘Sandy’ have a connection with one another, so when the woman attacked the gentleman, ‘Sandy’ felt it as well. O’Connor asks how ‘Sandy’ knows her name. ‘Sandy’ states her name was in the register, the woman is using the alias ‘Winnie Smith’, she is under arrest for murdering her husband. O’Connor suspects that ‘Sandy’ wishes to blackmail her. He denies this and hands the woman his business card – a glass business card. O’Connor believes ‘Sandy’ wishes to extort money from her and demands his price, but ‘Sandy’ has a different proposition in mind, she’ll do something for him and he’ll help O’Connor. She is to meet some ‘friends’ of his from their train – Jago, Litefoot and a young woman called Winnie. In exchange, he’ll gladly offer law advice and representation at her trial. O’Connor deduces that ‘Sandy’ is a solicitor, but he corrects her as a ‘Gentleman of Law’. He warns her his offer is a limited time as he will be on a boat-train to Dover the next morning. Winnie demands that he let her pass before she attacks him, he simply laughs her off and allows her passage before revealing that he is going upstairs to pay his last respects to their mutual friend.
Back on the train, Jago notices the time is five o’clock, which he believes isn’t right. Litefoot’s watch is the same time. Believing instead that the time is correct, Jago theorises that they’ve lost an entire night and that they’re about to be accosted by two ladies that they don’t recall meeting due to a drunken spree, but Litefoot is doubtful. He theorises that someone or something is manipulating time around them. Jago surprisingly believes it to be plausible. Litefoot tells Jago to look out the window of the train. Jago confirms that all he sees is blackness, but if he looks in the corner of his eye…they can see the station platform with people, but the people aren’t moving, as if they’re completely frozen. Amongst the crowd of people, the duo spot two familiar faces, Ellie and Leela!
At the Red Tavern, it is closing time but some of the patrons aren’t aware of this. Ellie asks Leela to give her a hand…only for Leela to threaten the patrons to leave or she’ll feed their innards to the ‘crows’ at the Tower of London. The Tavern falls silent, until a man corrects her by saying the ‘crows’ are ravens, sending the tavern into uproarious laughter. Ellie tells Leela to tone it down, after all they are paying customers (she even made a customer cry in fear) and she’ll want them to come back. Leela approaches a woman and demands she leave, but the woman depressingly tells her to do so as she has nothing to lose. Leela deduces the woman is troubled, as she has drunk eight glasses of alcohol. She also deduces the woman has killed someone, as she notices a small speck of blood on her clothes, even going as far as figuring that the woman didn’t know how to strike cleanly because the knife wasn’t sharp enough. The woman shakily denies the accusation, but Leela continues by inferring the woman murdered her husband as she has been pulling on her wedding ring all evening. The woman eventually confesses that he had it coming. Leela informs Ellie that the woman, introducing herself as Winnie, has murdered someone and asks if they should call the ‘blue guards’ (police). Winnie states the police can’t prove it and she has a lawyer. She hands the glass business card to Leela. Ellie is horrified when she sees the names on the card – Kempston and Hardwick…
Jago procures a fire extinguisher that he and Litefoot attempt to use to break the carriage windows. While the window didn’t completely break, it certainly cracked. As soon as the crack appears, it repairs itself. Litefoot is now certain that something is purposely sealing them in. Both men manage to open the carriage doors to the next carriage without any difficulty, meaning that whatever imprisoned them is allowing them passage up and down the train. Upon entering the next carriage, they make a horrific discovery…dead bodies.
Leela and Ellie interrogate Winnie on her business with Kempston and Hardwick. Winnie’s answers aren’t as clear cut as they’d hoped, as Winnie states they specialise in speculative ventures. Leela deduces that they dabble in future events. Winnie recounts how she met one of the two men in the hotel she was staying in and offered her his assistance. Leela believes he was helping her to escape justice. Ellie is suspicious of how Winnie managed to end up in her pub out of all the pubs in London. Winnie states that she had a feeling – a thirst. She asks for a glass of alcohol, which Leela begrudgingly gets for her. She reveals to Winnie that she and Ellie also have ‘accounts to settle’ with Kempston and Hardwick. Ellie reads the card and finds an address for the villainous pair’s office. Winnie opts to join them to meet with them.
Litefoot utilizes his pathology skills and examines the body of a dead woman, much to Jago’s unease. He determines the woman was in her late twenties and was of an upper-class background as he deduces from her calluses and expensive dress. The woman was dressing in a hurry as she had not properly fastened the stays. He also discovers the body has alcohol on her breath and reeks of the perfume the two men smelt earlier. Litefoot determines that this isn’t the same woman who spooked them earlier, as the body is already in a state of rigor mortis, meaning the woman must have been dead for at least six to seven hours. Litefoot peruses through the woman’s belongings and finds something rather strange…a glass business card with Kempston and Hardwick’s names. All of a sudden, the train begins to move…
Winnie leads Leela and Ellie to Kempston and Hardwick’s office. Leela suggests that they arm themselves for the conflict that is presumably about to come. Winnie becomes paranoid of the fact that Leela and Ellie have enough evidence to see her hang, so she demands to know what they know of Kempston and Hardwick. Both women can’t answer. Leela tells Winnie that her problems are inconsequential in comparison to the problems they face with Kempston and Hardwick. She gives her an ultimatum: either leave or stand with them against the villains. Winnie agrees to join them in their battle.
Back on the train, the train speeds through Charing Cross and it seems to be getting faster. Litefoot ponders about who could be driving the train. Jago believes the train has been hijacked by radicals, but Litefoot fails to see how driving a train at high speed on a circle line can be considered terrorism against the British Empire. Jago is relieved and hypothesises that they are maybe on a runaway train. Thankfully, the line they’re on doesn’t have buffers so there’s no chance of crashing into anything…unless they go so fast they crash into themselves. Litefoot decides that there are only two courses of action they can take. They either wrestle control of the train from the driver or they travel to the back of the train and jump onto the tracks. Unfortunately, both plans carry the slight possibility of getting killed. Both agree that jumping from the tracks is out of the question…so they both should instead fight the driver…
Leela, Ellie and Winnie approach Kempston and Hardwick’s office. Winnie informs the two women that their office is on the third floor of the building. Leela believes that from their window, they have a clear view of the street, so a direct attack is inadvisable. Suddenly, a light shines inside the office. The women duck to cover to avoid detection. Leela and Ellie failed to see anything inside…but Winnie shakily says she saw Kempston and he saw her. Believing themselves to have been spotted, Leela decides it is time to confront the crooked lawyers. She leads the way as she is armed. As they approach the building, the front door opens automatically, gesturing them inside…
Back on the train, Litefoot struggles to force the door, proclaiming its locked. Litefoot breaks off a loose piece of metal from the carriage, much to Jago’s objection to vandalism. Litefoot asks Jago to retrieve the dead woman’s glass card and cigarette case so they can use them to slide into the lock. Jago is reluctant to peruse a dead woman’s belongings. Jago heads to the rear of the carriage and opens the door to find out the body has disappeared. Litefoot believes that someone must have moved her corpse and is still on the train. All of a sudden, the train lurches violently and the hands on Jago and Litefoot’s watches start to move rapidly in reverse. Both men start to feel nauseous as their sense of time begins to reverse, they even start to speak backwards…
The three women enter Kempston and Hardwick’s office only to find they are not there. The building is dilapidated, and the other floors are unoccupied. Winnie suspects that Kempston and Hardwick are ghosts, but Leela is certain they are corporeal. After all, what would a ghost need with a boiling teapot? They discover a map of the London Underground on the desk and notice a certain line outlined on it – The Inner Circle line as well as a circle around the station Charing Cross. The reason its highlighted is because it’s the nearest station to the office as well as the hotel Winnie was staying at. The trio notice a grand clock. The clock makes Winnie feel uneasy. Her unease doesn’t go unnoticed by Leela and she questions why she is really accompanying them, especially considering that she could be sentenced to death for her crime. Leela asks again who Winnie really saw at the window before they entered. Winnie reveals she actually saw her dead husband at the window. Leela demands a further explanation of the clock and what it means to her. Winnie cryptically reveals it’s the beginning and the end…and the real reason she’s here…
Back on the train, time continues to reverse as Jago and Litefoot continue talking backwards. The effect stops, and the two investigators survey each other to make sure they’re okay. They notice that the train has stopped outside Charing Cross, with all the same people, including Leela and Ellie, and all the details intact. Only difference is that the view outside is clearer than before. Litefoot begins to have an idea of the predicament they are caught in. He instructs Jago to carefully study the patrons faces and poses. The people on the platform are running towards the train with a look of horror on each of their faces. They seem to be able to see something at the front of the train that Jago and Litefoot themselves cannot see. But Jago is fixated by a sinister looking gentleman on the platform who doesn’t seem to share the same apprehension as the rest of the passengers. They believe it may be either Kempston or Hardwick. Before they can ponder the mystery, the dead woman Litefoot conducted an autopsy on earlier enters the carriage. Litefoot congratulates the woman from ‘recovering’ from her rigor mortis. The two men apologise for their ‘intrusion’, the woman forgives them and strangely enough calls them by their names. As the woman knows their names, Litefoot asks who she is. The woman introduces herself as Winnie O’Connor and she holds up a clock and starts it…and the train begins to move again.
Back at the office, Leela instructs Winnie to put the clock down, but she refuses. Leela believes there is more to the clock than she is letting on, believing it to be of alien origin. Winnie still refuses and reveals to the two she is a thief and that the clock belonged to her husband Sandy. She elaborates that her husband was ‘a dodger’ who claimed to make his fortune in diamond fields. She further reveals that he was a long way from home and he had plans to return. To test her faith, he made Winnie walk around Greenwich with the clock, activating it at random intervals. Leela demands to know what the clock is. Winnie eventually reveals the clock is called a ‘time cracker’ and it generates spatial temporal continuities. But its use is restricted as it can only go back four episodic intervals. Funnily enough, when questioned about the technobabble, she doesn’t understand what any of it means. She reveals the reason why she murdered Sandy. He was abusive towards her, and she finally snapped and ended his life. Leela turns her concerns to the fact that Winnie saw Sandy at the window of the office. Winnie believes that he’s come back to haunt her for not sticking with him. Fed up of the situation, she flees out of the window and climbs down the drain pipe with the clock in tow. Leela and Ellie give chase to Charing Cross Station.
Back on the train, the revived Winnie threatens Jago and Litefoot with the time cracker, stating it’s the key to the remainder of their futures. Jago warns her they’ve faced more dangerous enemies than her. Winnie isn’t fazed and taunts them saying they can’t do anything to her as long as she has the time cracker, even calling Jago a coward for hesitating to attack her. Litefoot deduces the device isn’t from Earth. Winnie gleefully admits she’s already killed herself once with it. She reveals that she knows a lot about the two men, as she’s met with Leela and Ellie as part of Sandy’s plan. To get all of them under the spell of the time cracker. Litefoot deduces that the device can manipulate time. Winnie instructs the men to look at their watches, they see that the hands are rapidly accelerating clockwise. Jago suspects that Winnie isn’t doing any of this of her own volition and offers her to surrender. But she refuses, she can’t understand herself what’s happening. Jago pretends to feel a draft and asks Litefoot to seal the door shut. Litefoot does so, but Jago shoves him through the door and locks him in the adjacent carriage, apologising as he does so. Jago grabs the beam to seal the door shut behind him to prevent Litefoot from getting back in. He plans to decouple the carriages from one another…
Leela and Ellie arrive at Charing Cross, but there is no sign of Winnie. The station gates are open, so she must have already arrived at the platform. They are stopped by the stationmaster, who won’t let them in unless they buy a ticket. Ellie asks him if they are the first customers of the day. The stationmaster slowly confirms that another rather rude woman hurriedly passed through earlier. The two women dash down to the platform to catch the train.
Litefoot demands that Jago opens the door. Jago doesn’t want to argue with his friend. Suddenly, Hardwick materialises in Litefoot’s carriage. He reveals that he was the one driving the train and the reason they didn’t crash moments ago. Litefoot assumes that Hardwick is manipulating Winnie into doing his dirty work with either drugs or hypnotism, but Hardwick reveals that Winnie is only acting out of love and that the train is approaching its final destination where he and Kempston will meet them. Litefoot tells him they’ve seen where they’re headed. Charing Cross with all the frozen patrons. Hardwick reveals they plucked Winnie out of time before her death for their nefarious deeds and very soon, Winnie will appear in two places at once. Hardwick further reveals the entire train plot is a massive publicity stunt to get the attention of anyone who abhors temporal anomalies – like a certain time traveller. Winnie notices Hardwick at the door and bangs on it to get his attention, calling him ‘Sandy’. Hardwick reveals that she won’t get in as he’s sealed the doors. Hardwick comments that she does look rather agitated, Litefoot confirms that she believed she killed him the night before – ‘Sandy’ and Hardwick are the same person! He remarks that it will take more than a knife to kill him. He tells his side of the story from the attack. While he tried to reason with Winnie, she stabbed him. Kempston was also present in the room and used mind control to subdue her. Winnie begins to cry out incessantly to ‘Sandy’, he decides that its best to take his leave and disappears. Winnie despairs when ‘Sandy’ disappears. Jago tries to convince her that he isn’t called ‘Sandy’, but an evil man. But Winnie won’t listen and informs him that they are nearly at their destination as she activates her time cracker once more, promising it’ll be the last time he’ll feel its effect…
Leela and Ellie find Winnie on the platform. They try to convince Winnie to break Hardwick’s control over her. Leela warns Winnie if she prolongs the use of the time cracker, it will eventually split time open. Winnie deliriously cries that its no go and announces that the train is coming, she begs the two women to get away and save themselves as she prepares to jump into the path of the oncoming train…
The time cracker’s effect wears off and Jago can see Leela, Ellie and Winnie on the platform much more clearly this time and they’re moving this time rather slowly than completely frozen. Winnie confirms she can see herself on the platform. Ellie and Leela are reaching out to try and stop Winnie from committing suicide. Winnie can also see another man standing behind her on the platform, a man in a black suit, top hat and opera cloak holding a silver cane. Jago angrily assumes the man will push Winnie into the path of the train. Winnie states that she is already dead, that woman on the platform is her ghost, and the man behind her must be Death. The mysterious stranger approaches Winnie from behind and reaches out to claim her handbag. Winnie on the platform struggles with the stranger, but the man claims the handbag and reaches inside it and takes out Kempston and Hardwick’s glass business card, but Winnie manages to reclaim the card from the stranger. Jago asks what’s so important about the card? Winnie tells him that it whispers voices in her head, relaying commands in a glassy voice. The stranger’s identity becomes clearer now and Jago confirms his identity – Professor Claudius Darke. Unfortunately, during the struggle, Winnie loses her balance and falls in front of the train to her death, while Darke manages to stay on the platform. Litefoot manages to burst through the carriage door and reveals the details of his conversation with ‘Sandy’. Winnie was plucked out of time moments before her death by Hardwick and projected back in time by five hours. She is both dead and alive at the same time, creating a temporal anomaly. Jago realises that Darke wasn’t trying to steal the card from her, he was trying to save her from the voices in her head that would instruct her to meddle with the time cracker. Jago requests she show him the glass card and the time cracker. She does so and Jago throws them both to the ground, destroying them and undoing all the damage to time once and for all.
Darke announces that the train is terminating at Charing Cross. Winnie demands to know what is going on. Darke proudly states that Jago and Litefoot happened while addressing Leela. Jago and Litefoot emerge from the train and reunite with Leela and Ellie. Winnie notices her other self has disappeared and angrily accuses Darke of being a bag snatcher. Darke retorts that she is a housebreaker and unfortunate bait in a temporal trap. Jago and Litefoot demand to know what part Darke had in all the transpired events. Before he can explain, he requests Ellie to take Winnie back to her hotel. Leela assures her that Darke can be trusted, and so she leaves. Darke begins by explaining that the temporal trap was meant for him, unfortunately it worked. Winnie being in two places was able to trap Jago and Litefoot in the train AND lure Ellie and Leela into the station as well, all at the behest of a malevolent piece of alien technology – the time cracker and the business card. It was too much for the mysterious Professor to just ignore not just because of the time anomaly, but because his friends were endangered. But Leela assures Darke that they succeeded, Winnie survived. But Darke’s demeanour says otherwise. Before Darke can continue, Jago asks Leela if she is acquainted with Darke. Leela smiles and confirms it and asks how they haven’t figured out who his true identity is yet. Darke decides to give them a clue – he can play the trumpet voluntarily in a bowl of live goldfish and that he nearly died on the stage of the Palace Theatre numerous times. Jago is fed up of Darke beating about the bush and Leela is surprised despite all the clues, he still hasn’t figured out Darke’s identity. Darke announces that they haven’t got time and the Sandmen are on the way. The same creatures that Jago and Litefoot encountered before they left for Brighton. Litefoot’s patience also begins to wear thin and he demands that Darke tell them who he really is! Darke drops the last damning clue to his identity – the threat they face will make Weng-Chiang pale in comparison and he needs Jago and Lifefoot to stand with him once more against a deadly alien threat. At last, Jago and Litefoot seem to realise who the man is. They look at Darke in shock and surprise. It can’t be, can it? Darke confirms their suspicions – Professor Claudius Darke is The Sixth Doctor!
