'Day of the Moon' (Story Code 6.2) by Steven Moffat

“We’re not fighting an alien invasion. We’re leading a revolution. And today the battle begins.” – The Doctor

Three months later, in the Valley of the Gods, Utah, in July 1969: Amy is running for her life, pursued by Canton Everett Delaware III and an armed squad of Men in Black. Cornered at the edge of a ravine, Amy thinks back to when she, the Doctor, Rory and River fled with Canton from the grey-faced creatures in black suits – and then she is shot point-blank by the man she thought was a friend… Canton takes Amy’s body back to Area 51, Nevada, to gloat to his prisoner, a heavily-bearded Doctor chained up in a strait-jacket. When Canton asks why Amy had drawn strange tally marks drawn on herself the Doctor just comments on how Canton’s men are currently constructing the perfect prison around him, using building-blocks made of zero-balanced Dwarf-Star alloy… Some time earlier, on the fiftieth floor of a New York skyscraper under construction, River comes face to face with two of the grey aliens. River marks herself on her arm with a tally-mark to record the encounter, but the creatures vanish at the arrival of Canton and a squad of armed Men in Black; as her pursuers converge on her, River backs away towards an open window – and then deliberately falls backwards towards the street far below… At Glen Canyon Dam, Arizona, a tally-marked Rory is cornered by Canton and his men; but as Rory raises his hands in surrender, Canton guns him down… Back in Area 51, the Doctor is dismayed to see Canton’s men drag in two body-bags containing the corpses of his friends. As the last brick of the Doctor’s inescapable prison is put in place, Canton remains inside the large black cube to supervise his prisoner. But when Canton confirms that nothing can penetrate the structure, the Doctor is actually pleased – because he isn’t really chained up, and Amy and Rory aren’t actually dead! Canton has put on a huge performance just to get the trio where the aliens cannot hear them, and not only that, but the prison also contains the invisible TARDIS! Dashing into the time-space ship, the Doctor transports them to New York in time to intercept the falling River, catching her in the TARDIS’ swimming pool; the Time Lord then takes everyone to the Cape Kennedy launch-pad of N.A.S.A.’s Apollo 11 space mission, where the Doctor has plans for “Neil Armstrong’s foot”… A short while later, a freshly-shaved Doctor compares notes about the aliens with Amy, Rory, River and Canton; the Time Lord also injects his friends’ hands with nano-recorders, a better way of recording their encounters with the creatures than drawing on themselves. After Amy confides to the Doctor that she made a mistake, and that she is not actually pregnant, Canton is surprised to find his recorder already flashing; he then learns that he has just seen a recording of one of the creatures, extrapolated from the image that Amy took on her mobile phone. Explaining how even recordings of the creatures can make a person forget, the Doctor notes how he also used Canton’s amnesia to plant a post-hypnotic suggestion to tweak his bow tie! The Doctor’s next course of action is to find the little girl, whom he has tracked to Greystark Hall Orphanage. Canton and Amy are despatched to investigate the establishment, a dilapidated building with walls daubed with warnings to “Get Out”; here they meet the proprietor, a confused, forgetful doctor named Renfrew, who thinks it is prior to 1967. While Canton accompanies Renfrew to his office, Amy explores the orphanage’s upper level; walking through a deserted ward, Amy telephones the Doctor, but he has his own problems, having just been discovered fiddling with the controls of the Apollo 11 command capsule! Noticing that her recorder is flashing, Amy is shocked to see a reflection of herself in a nearby window: she is covered in tally marks. Not seeing any of the creatures around her, Amy looks up and sees dozens of the grey-faced aliens hanging from the ceiling, all apparently asleep – until she wakes them by kicking a nearby bucket. As the creatures begin to stir Amy turns to run – and instantly forgets what she has just seen. Back at N.A.S.A., Cape Kennedy, a handcuffed Doctor is questioned by the base’s head of security; luckily for the Time Lord, he is rescued by the arrival of President Nixon, who has been transported in the TARDIS by Rory and River. Back at the orphanage, Amy sees a mysterious woman with an eye-patch looking through the viewing hatch of a nearby door; but when Amy enters the room the woman has gone, and so has the hatch. Looking around, Amy finds many framed photographs of the little girl – and also one of herself, holding a baby. At that moment the astronaut walks into the room. When the suited figure raises its bullet-marked visor to reveal the little girl’s frightened face, Amy apologises for shooting her; luckily for them both, she missed her target. Then two of the grey-faced creatures enter the room… Amy’s cries are heard by Canton and Doctor Renfrew, but another of the creatures appears and stops the ex-agent from leaving the room; activating his recorder, Canton pulls out a gun and shoots the alien, then rushes to help Amy, phoning the Doctor en route. Having dropped off the President in the White House, the Doctor, River and Rory travel to the orphanage and join Canton; but they are too late: Amy has been taken, and her extracted nano-recorder has been left lying on the floor of the little girl’s room alongside the now-empty spacesuit. To Rory’s dismay Amy’s recorder is still relaying his wife’s sobbing voice, calling to him and the Doctor to rescue her. Learning of the wounded alien downstairs, the Doctor questions the creature, which identifies itself as “The Silence”; hearing this name, the Doctor immediately recalls all the references to this mysterious race that he has heard recently… A short while later, back at Area 51, the base’s security agents are astonished when the black prison cube opens and Canton emerges along with President Nixon. Meanwhile, the Doctor and River return to the abandoned warehouse to examine the empty spacesuit. They discover that it has been augmented with alien technology to create a fully-functioning exo-skeleton, which must have operated independently before it captured the girl; when the child became scared the suit automatically contacted the person with the most authority, in this case, the President of America. While River is intrigued by how strong the girl must have been to force her way out of the suit, the Doctor considers how the super-parasitical Silence have influencing human behaviour for thousands of years, and how they have deliberately brought about America’s space mission just so to get their hands on a space suit… Back in Area 51, Canton oversees the base doctor’s treatment of the captive Silence’s wounds; deliberately baiting the creature, Canton records its words on his videophone and then sends them to the Doctor.

Eleven days later, as the Apollo 11 mission approaches the Moon, Amy awakes to find herself a prisoner in the Silence’s control room; but as the suited creatures prepare to send their captive to sleep once more, they are interrupted by the sudden arrival of the TARDIS. To Amy’s relief the Doctor emerges from the ship, carrying a portable television set and remarking on how he saw a similar control room back at Aickman Road. While River holds off the Silence at gunpoint and Rory tries to free Amy, the Doctor offers the Silence the opportunity to surrender, but the creatures stoically refuse. As the television continues to show the live transmission of the Moon landing, the Doctor comments on how Neil Armstrong’s imminent arrival on the lunar surface will be one of the most unforgettable moments in history. The Doctor then calls Canton on his mobile phone and instructs him to activate the equipment the Time Lord placed in the Apollo command capsule: the Moon landing broadcast is suddenly interrupted by the recording of the Silent, now edited to make the creature’s gloating words form an instruction to kill its race on sight. All across the world, humanity hears the instruction to turn on the aliens: people turn and kill any of the creatures they find, and then promptly forget what they have just seen, heard and done. Furious at being manipulated into creating an army that will wipe them out, the Silence close in on the Doctor and his friends; but River is ready, and she opens fires on the aliens while the Doctor gets Rory and Amy into the TARDIS. Once River has dealt with the Silence, Amy and Rory enjoy a happy reunion; the Doctor then drops Canton off in the Oval Office, confirming to the President that Earth is now safe from the Silence (although the planet is still under threat from plenty of other extraterrestrial menaces out there!). Promising the President that he will always be remembered – albeit not in the way he wants – the Doctor bids goodbye to Nixon, who is then somewhat surprised to learn that the reason the agent left the F.B.I. was so he could marry his black gay boyfriend… Dropping River off at the Stormcage Facility, the Doctor is flummoxed when the archaeologist snogs him; for the Doctor it’s the first time they have kissed;, but it is the last for River… Returning to the TARDIS, the Doctor asks Amy why she chose to tell him about her misdiagnosed pregnancy rather than Rory; Amy confesses that she didn’t think her husband could handle a child affected by her time-space travels. Rory overhears via his wife’s nano-recorder, but Amy knows he is listening, and the two quickly make up. Now that he has solved the mystery of the Silence, the Doctor has one last unanswered question: who was the little girl? Unseen by Amy, the Doctor scans his friend, and is confused that her pregnancy is wavering between positive and negative…

Six months later, in New York, a tramp is surprised to meet a strange little girl in an alley. The child is apparently dying – but then she starts to regenerate…


Matt Smith (The Doctor), Karen Gillan (Amy Pond), Arthur Darvill (Rory Williams), Alex Kingston (Doctor River Song), Mark Sheppard (Canton Everett Delaware III), Marnix Van Den Broeke (The Silent), Stuart Milligan (President Richard Milhous Nixon), Kerry Shale (Doctor Renfrew), Glenn Wrage (Gardener), Jeff Marsh (Grant), Sydney Wade (Little Girl), Tommy Campbell (Sergeant), Peter Banks (Doctor Shepherd), Frances Barber (Eye Patch Lady), Ricky Fearon (Tramp), Chuk Iwuji (Carl), Mark Griffin (Phil)

Directed by Toby Haynes
Produced by Marcus Wilson
Executive Producers Steven Moffat, Piers Wenger and Beth Willis
A BBC Wales production, co-produced with BBC America

TX (BBC 1 & BBC 1 HD):
30th April 2011 @ 6.00 pm

Notes:
*Featuring the Eleventh Doctor, Amy, Rory and River

*Part two of a two part story

*Working title: 'Look Behind You'