In the Petrified Forest

The TARDIS has brought the travellers to the planet Skaro where they find themselves in a petrified forest on an apparently dead planet. However, on exploring further they find an futuristic looking alien city in the distance. The Doctor is anxious to investigate further, but Ian Chesterton and Barbara Wright insist that they return to the TARDIS.

Reluctantly The Doctor agrees but on their return The Doctor tricks his fellow travellers into believing that the TARDIS is faulty and that they will need to obtain some Mercury so as to fix his time machine. When it is realised that the most likely place to obtain some might be in the city it looks as if The Doctor will get to visit there after all.

On reaching the city, the travellers split up to explore. The Doctor, Ian and Susan discover a chamber containing a detector which indicates a dangerous level of radiation in the atmosphere. Meanwhile Barbara finds herself a prisoner of the city's inhabitants - the Daleks who are hideously mutated and have to live in metal life-support casings.

The Travellers Find the Dalek City

It is not long before they are all captured by the Daleks and it is then that The Doctor and his companions soon start to show signs of radiation sickness. Susan is eventually sent to retrieve anti-radiation drugs from the TARDIS. She believes that she is obtaining them for herself and her fellow travellers, but the Daleks plan to keep them for themselves so that the can be used to allow them to leave the confines of the city.

On reaching the TARDIS Susan encounters a second species living on Skaro, the Thals, who are beautiful humanoids with pacifist principles. On returning to the Dalek’s city, with a second set of anti-radiation drugs, given to her by the Thals as they do not trust the Daleks, The Doctor and his companions start to recover from the radiation sickness.

Barbara Meets a Dalek

Susan then tells them that she has learnt that the Daleks are at war with the Thals and that the current situation is the result of a nuclear war that was fought some 500 years ago. She also tells them that the Thals are starving and they want to live peacefully with the Daleks.

The Doctor and his companions finally manage to escape from the Dalek's city but not before it becomes quite clear, when the Daleks opening fire on the Thals in what was supposed to be a peaceful exchange of food, that the Daleks are only interested in exterminating the Thals.

In order to save the Thals from the Daleks, The Doctor with the help of his companions manage to convince the Thals of the importance of aggression and the need to fight for their own survival. Joining forces with them, and braving Skaro's many dangers, they launch a two-pronged attack on the Dalek's city.

Threatening Daleks

A final confrontation takes place in the Daleks' control room and the Daleks are all believed to be killed when, during the course of the fighting, their power supply is cut off. The Doctor and his companions bid farewell to the Thals and depart from Skaro in the TARDIS.

However, once the ship is in flight the TARDIS is rocked by an explosion and the four travellers are thrown to the floor as the control room is plunged into darkness.