Litefoot is resting at his home until a mighty crash awakens him. He arms himself and discovers a giant metal sphere in his dining room. Sergeant Quick advises Litefoot to take up residence elsewhere as the building is now unsafe to inhabit, despite the fact the sphere did no damage to the house upon appearing. He also provides the cover story to his superiors that the spheres are pieces of art used as a publicity stunt by a band of bohemian sculptors.
Litefoot decides to stay at the Red Tavern’s free house while He, Jago and Leela investigate. Jago and Leela follow the time compass and discover more of time unravelling around them. They first hear a shipping forecast on a radio, as well as a group of planes fly overhead from World War II and shoot at one another, causing them to crash near them.
Litefoot and Quick follow a potential lead that may lead them to Payne, by inquiring at a local electrician’s shop, as Payne would need a great deal of electrical machinery to power his devices. They manage to find the name of Nikola Tesla among a particular electrician’s clientele, which sticks out considering that Tesla is currently at work in America (the electrician believes it must be a relative), as well as the mysterious Professor Darke…
Meanwhile, Payne is busy preparing his base of operations in an abandoned Turkish bathhouse next to the Regency Theatre. He lays several time bombs around the base that would displace anyone that should fall into them. He has also managed to kidnap famed scientist Nikola Tesla to help with his experiments, who is reluctantly working with him against his will.
Both parties reunite at the Red Tavern, unfortunately, the spheres follow them to the Tavern, the spheres demand that Jago and Litefoot must bring Payne to them, destroying the pub in the process, much to Ellie the Barmaid’s horror. After the sphere’s intrusion, a clone of Jago emerges before the group, revealing that he is the real Henry Gordon Jago. Leela uses her time compass to ascertain the real Jago. She reveals that they are BOTH Jago, but the clone is Jago from the future. The future Jago deliriously reveals the horrors he has witnessed in London due to the time distortions, and that they failed in their mission to defeat Payne. He got warped back to the outside of the Red Tavern and emerged to warn the group.
They trace the disturbances to the Turkish bathhouse thanks to the aforementioned electrician. Jago, Litefoot and Quick go as one group through the entrance while Future Jago and Leela find a back entrance. As they infiltrate it, the duo are discovered by a sabre-tooth tiger brought forward in time by Payne’s experiments. Leela wrestles with it and kills it. Unfortunately, Future Jago falls for one of Payne’s time bombs and is displaced, thus enabling him to witness the horrific future and go back and warn the group in the Red Tavern hours beforehand. Jago, Litefoot and Quick summon the police to the bathhouse to raid it. But the spheres arrive and break their way inside…
Payne discovers the spheres have found him and he reveals his backstory to the group. He is a scientist from 2000 years in the future, he and his wife were studying a black hole on the edge of its event horizon. They also discovered creatures that fed on time within its horizon. Unfortunately, his wife fell into the horizon and became trapped in a time field. The spheres, calling themselves ‘Time Eaters’ bargained with Payne. If they provided him with the knowledge to manipulate time to his whim and provide them with time energy so they could be completely free, he could have his wife returned to him. Litefoot manages to convince Payne of the error of his ways as the creatures are incapable of returning his wife to him and were using him so they could amass enough energy to feast on time across the universe, making the concept of time null and void with everything happening at once. Litefoot instructs Payne to create a time portal to 1940 to intercept the bomb that would destroy the theatre and redirect it to the base, killing the Time Eaters and destroying the technology. Unfortunately, Litefoot elects to stay behind to keep the creatures at bay. The bomb detonates and destroys the base, thankfully Litefoot manages to survive.
With the time distortions fixed, Leela prepares to leave to return to Gallifrey, much to the disappointment of Jago, Litefoot and Ellie. Later, Quick is approached by Leela, who reveals that something is blocking her return to Gallifrey, it is something bigger and more dangerous than the previous events that have transpired.
Later, Jago and Litefoot meet up on the pretence that the other wanted to meet with the other. They both deny sending each other a message, before they can deliberate who could have summoned them. A sinister man emerges from the shadows who seems to recognise them both and confirms he sent for them both, he reveals that they are in grave danger and that they will be here soon. Both men insist that this man identifies himself. The man reveals his name to be…Claudius Darke…
