Parts: 1 (50-minute)
Writer: Steven Moffat
Airdate: 25 December 2024
Production Code: n/a

Doctors: fifteenth
Companions: Joy, Anita

Megalomaniac of the Week: Villengard

Story: In search of fresh milk for his morning coffee, the Doctor briefly pops into the Time Hotel, situated in London 4202, but with rooms extending across the entire breadth of human history — book a night at the fall of Troy, the London Blitz, or the Orient Express, and spend the day luxuriating in the famous cultures and events of the past. But as he leaves, the Doctor spots something odd, which niggles worryingly at his brain: a man with a briefcase chained to his wrist. What might he be doing at the Time Hotel, and what does he want? In order to find out, the Doctor decides, he needs to investigate the rooms.

Several rooms in, having hopped from timezone to timezone, the Doctor pops into a hotel room in London, at Christmas 2024 — at the same time as the briefcase courier finds him. The Doctor soon realizes that the briefcase is hopping from courier to courier, trying to gain access to something in the Time Hotel... and inside it, he learns, is a "star seed", an object of considerable mystery but which seems to have no regard for human life.