The Doctor

In South America, 1988, a man named De Flores receives confirmation that ‘the landing’ is to take place the next day, the 23rd November, in Windsor. He calls together a group of paramilitary men and they toast their destiny: the Fourth Reich. They then leave for England, taking with them a silver bow.

In Windsor, in the year 1638, a sorceress called Lady Peinforte is anxious for a mathematician to complete his calculations. He eventually tells her that the object of her interest will land in the meadow outside in the year 1988. Peinforte and her squire, Richard, kill the mathematician to obtain blood for a potion. Taking with them a supply of poisoned gold-tipped arrows and a single silver arrow, they use the potion to travel forward in time to 1988, materialising in the middle of a crowded restaurant.

The Doctor and Ace are meanwhile listening to an outdoor jazz recital given by Courtney Pine and his musicians. The Doctor’s pocket watch bleeps but he is unable to remember what this alarm signifies. They then head back to the TARDIS but on the way they are attacked by two men wearing strange headphone-like devices. They manage to escape and get back to the TARDIS, where The Doctor uses a scanner device, incorporated into a new ghettoblaster that he has built for Ace, to display an image of Earth. The Doctor admits that he has known since the 23rd November 1638 that the planet will be destroyed at this time. He takes Ace to a storage area in Windsor castle to find a silver bow, but it is not there. They then travel in the TARDIS to Lady Peinforte’s house in 1638, where The Doctor discovers the dead mathematician. This confirms, to The Doctor, that Lady Peinforte has travelled forward in time to 1988.

Ace

The Doctor tells Ace that a quantity of a silver-coloured living metal called validium, the purpose of which is destruction, fell to Earth and was used by Lady Peinforte to make a statue of herself. The statue has three components - a bow, an arrow and the figure itself - that must be brought together in order for it to be activated. They have been separated since 1638 when, in order to foil the first attempt by Lady Peinforte to seize it, The Doctor launched the figure into orbit in a powered asteroid. Since then the asteroid has been approaching Earth at twenty-five yearly intervals, leaving a succession of disasters in its wake.

With the next arrival due in 1988 The Doctor and Ace return to that time-zone but the TARDIS arrives in the grounds of Windsor Castle, There they try to follow the Queen inside, in an attempt to summon help, but they are apprehended by two guards. Meanwhile the meteor lands in Windsor and it is cordoned off by the police. But they are all knocked out by a gas that starts to be emitted from alien-looking pipes that emerge from the earth around the strange looking object. Shortly afterwards De Flores and his men arrive to take charge of the meteor. Unaware that they are being watched by Lady Peinforte and Richard, who are in hiding, De Flores’s second in command, Karl, places the bow on the meteor which starts to glow in time with the statue buried inside. The TARDIS arrives and De Flores threatens to kill Ace unless The Doctor tells him where the arrow is. The Doctor explains that validium needs to have a critical mass to operate and that both the bow and the arrow are required to make up this mass.

Courtney Pine

Suddenly a massive spaceship arrives and from it emerge Cybermen, who attack De Flores’s men. Lady Peinforte and Richard also despatch several Cybermen with their gold-tipped arrows. In the confusion, The Doctor grabs the bow and, along with Ace, they depart in the TARDIS leaving The Cybermen to defeat De Flores’s men. The Cybermen then take the meteor into a nearby hangar in order to cut the statue out of it. They then take the statue to Lady Peinforte’s crypt elsewhere in the grounds of Windsor Castle and hide it in her tomb, where they wait in the expectation that The Doctor will bring the bow to them. But the TARDIS arrives elsewhere in the grounds and The Doctor uses the bow to home in on the statue. He explains to Ace that validium was created by Omega and Rassilon as the ultimate defence for Gallifrey in the olden times. Meanwhile the Cybermen try to communicate with their fleet, but The Doctor jams their transmissions by playing a jazz tape on Ace’s ghettoblaster.

When Lady Peinforte and Richard arrive at the crypt the Cybermen believe that Lady Peinforte will be driven mad by the realisation of her own death, but this does not happen. Richard instead destroys several more Cybermen with the gold-tipped arrows. Meanwhile Ace blows up the Cybermen’s spaceship with some of her nitro-9 while The Doctor distracts its human guards (who are the same men who attacked them after the jazz recital). The Cybermen then kill the men for failing in their task of protecting their spaceship.

Back at the TARDIS, The Doctor is at first unable to locate the Cybermen’s fleet on the holographic ‘screen’ above Ace’s ghettoblaster. He then realises that the fleet of spaceships are invisible. But he overcomes this, thereby revealing thousands of Cyber warships waiting in space.

Ace and The Doctor

Meanwhile Lady Peinforte finds the statue in her tomb, but escapes with Richard through a secret exit as De Flores arrives. The Cyber Leader also returns to the tomb with the silver arrow, which is grasped by the statue. As the statue starts to come to life The Doctor and Ace arrive, and The Doctor allows the statue to touch the bow for a moment before snatching it away again. As the statue awakes they run for the TARDIS, The Doctor explaining to Ace that it will now follow the bow. The Doctor takes the TARDIS first to Lady Peinforte’s house in 1638, where Ace obtains some gold coins, and then back to the meteor in the hangar where they witness the statue arriving and coming to rest in the meteor. When The Doctor gives it the bow, the statue talks to Ace and explains that it is whatever it is made to be – and at the moment it is Nemesis.

The Cybermen arrive and attack the hangar. They chase after Ace, who picks the Cybermen off one by one by firing gold coins at them with a catapult. The Doctor meanwhile sets up the meteor so that, when launched, it will be on course for the Cyber fleet in space. He intends Nemesis to destroy the fleet, but declines to release it once it has completed this task as he may have further use for it. He puts paid to the remaining Cybermen in the hangar by causing the meteor’s in-built rockets to fire automatically. De Flores then arrives and tries to take charge, only to be killed by the Cyber Leader after it recovers from being hit by Ace’s final gold coin. Lady Peinforte also arrives, accompanied by Richard, and argues with the Cyber Leader over who should have the bow. Lady Peinforte gloats that she alone knows The Doctor’s true identity, as this was revealed to her by the statue.

The Doctor appears to concede defeat; however he gives the bow not to Lady Peinforte but to the Cyber Leader. Lady Peinforte threatens to reveal The Doctor’s secrets – of the old time on Gallifrey, the time of chaos – but the Cyber Leader has no interest in this. The Doctor returns the bow to Nemesis and the Cyber Leader orders the statue to launch. But at the last moment, Lady Peinforte jumps into the meteor with the statue and merges with it. The meteor launches and destroys the Cyber fleet. This prompts the Cyber Leader to try and kill The Doctor, but Richard grabs a gold-tipped arrow that was lodged in the TARDIS door and uses it to destroy the creature.

With Lady Peinforte, De Flores and the Cybermen defeated The Doctor and Ace return Richard to 1638. There Ace asks The Doctor who he really is, but in response he just puts a finger to his lips…