Remember Ali, the little boy who The Doctor, Wyn, Alec and Jasmin looked after at Christmas. Time has passed. Now he’s a young man, and he needs help.

The first part of the story was written quite some time before the rest of it. I had the idea of Jasmin as a qualified doctor being asked to look at the strange patient in casualty and the connection between them being established. She got the pendant with the Seal of Rassilon on it from The Doctor as her Christmas present – despite the fact that she doesn’t celebrate Christmas, of course. Ali was given the TARDIS key as a parting gift from The Doctor when he left Earth to return to his own planet.

I got that far and then had no idea what should happen next. So I left it alone and got on with some other stories for a while. I came back to it eventually and wrote the part where the bad guys arrive at the hospital and The Doctor turns up in the nick of time. THEN I had to work out WHY they were there.

The story of Ali as the ‘key’ who would re-animate his people once their period of cryogenic sleep was over became the fundamental point of the story. The betrayal by the faction was a complication to it.

Would The Doctor have fired that gun? Well, of course not. He’s The Doctor. He would always choose the other option if there is one.

Meanwhile, Ali goes to live with Jasmin and Alec and The Doctor plans to go visit Wyn in Llanfairfach. The trip should take an hour. Jasmin and Alec take bets on how long it will REALLY take him. They have NO idea HOW long it might be.

peace on earth