- In the near future, the Doctor and Clara find themselves on a space shuttle making a suicide mission to the Moon. Crash-landing on the lunar surface they find the most terrible things.
- In 2049, The Doctor, Clara, and student Courtney Woods find themselves on the moon. Something is horribly wrong. Now, the fate of the moon lies in the hands of Clara Oswald. Destroy it and yourselves to save Earth?, or let it live and risk the ultimate destruction of the Human race?
- After the events of "The Caretaker", Clara Oswald warns The Doctor that her student, Courtney Woods, is still interested in his TARDIS and is trying to clean up the mess inside it she made previously. As they enter the TARDIS, the Doctor stops Courtney from cleaning and offers to take her and Clara on a trip in the time machine. They arrive in 2049 on a Space Shuttle filled with nuclear devices on crash course with the Moon. They survive the crash and while the Doctor is curious as to higher-than-expected gravity they are experiencing, the three are met by Captain Lundvik and two other astronauts. After dismissing the Doctor's attempt to call their presence as a school trip, Lundvik explains they are on a suicide mission to blow up the Moon; she explains that years prior, there was a sudden mass high tide, wiping out a significant fraction of humanity and taking out many of Earth's artificial satellites. Mankind abandoned scientific advancement for the sake of the survival of the species, a decision Lundvik regretted as she was poised to help lead a major space program prior to the disaster. A Mexican colony on the Moon had reported changes in the Moon before Earth lost contact with them, leading scientists to believe the problem existed there. They surmised that by destroying the Moon, they will be able to save humanity from further harm. In private, Clara tries to ask the Doctor about this point in time, knowing that in future events she has witnessed the Moon is still there; the Doctor reveals this is a fluxed moment in time, the actions yet to be decided, and he is unable to become involved in those choices. The group sets for the Mexican colony, which they find oddly covered in spiderwebs. Lundvik sends one of the crew members to prime the bombs as they explore the colony, though he is attacked on the way back when he investigates an opening on the surface. In the colony, they find the colonists entombed in more spider webs. The Doctor reviews the readings the colonists had taken, showing seismic activity on the surface and an increase of the Moon's mass by over 1 billion tons, explaining the sudden tidal shift on Earth. A spider-like creature attacks them, killing Lundvik's other astronaut, but Courtney is able to kill the creature using disinfecting fluid she had brought for the TARDIS earlier. The Doctor realizes these creatures are like germs, and after returning Courtney to the safety of the TARDIS, leads the group back outside to investigate one of the cracks on the surface. They find thousands more spider-like creatures inside the crack, and the Doctor discovers amniotic fluid nearby. To the others' surprise, the Doctor tells them he will be back and dives into the hole. Clara and Lundvik witness the Shuttle fall into a crack on the surface, and return to the colony to wait, with Lundvik preparing to set the timer on the nuclear detonators despite Clara's assurance the Doctor will be back. The Doctor appears soon after and brings the TARDIS to the colony, where Courtney is still safe. The Doctor explains that the Moon is really a 100-million-year-old egg, the creature inside ready to hatch, and the spider-like creatures the equivalent of microbes on the surface of the egg. Lundvik immediately asserts that they should still destroy the Moon and kill the creature as to prevent any possible harm to humanity the creature may cause, but Clara refuses to accept this solution and turns to the Doctor for advice. The Doctor harshly reminds them he cannot be involved and promptly leaves in the TARDIS, abandoning the three of them on the Moon and forcing them to come to a decision within about an hour and half, the time left before the egg hatches. Clara, Courtney and Lundvik attempt to come to a decision but none of them can make the choice about saving humanity at the cost of sacrificing the life of the creature in the egg. As the spider creatures begin to swarm the surface, Lundvik is able to make contact with Earth, and Clara uses a simultaneous television broadcast to plead to humanity to help them make their choice, by either turning off their lights to destroy the Moon or keeping them on to let the creature live (a scene shown in medias res at the start of the episode). Lundvik then initiates the countdown on the nuclear devices as they wait for Earth's response which they will be able to see from the Moon. The lights on Earth go out, but Clara intervenes and stops the countdown. At the last moment, the Doctor returns, knowing they have decided to allow the creature to live, and rescues them from the Moon as it starts to crumble. Back on Earth, the four watch as the dragon-like creature is hatched and flies away, the shell of the Moon harmlessly disintegrating. At Clara's insistence, the Doctor reveals that because of the brief re-interest in what happened with the Moon, humanity would be rekindled to travel to the stars, helping them to spread across the universe, and then assures Lundvik that she will now have a real space program to lead. They then witness a new Moon a freshly-laid egg by the creature appear in Earth's orbit. After they return Lundvik and Courtney to their proper time and place, Clara accosts the Doctor about forcing her to make that choice, telling him that if he makes himself a friend of Earth, it is his decision too. She ultimately tells him that she does not want to see him again. After she leaves the TARDIS back at Coal Hill, she is comforted by Danny Pink. She explains to him that she is done with the Doctor but Danny notes that she is really not ready to move on. When asked how he became so wise, we learn that he left the army under circumstances that he refers to as a "really bad day". Later that evening, Clara returns to her flat and looks out onto the Moon.
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