Act 2: Everything Appears Lost
Timing malfunction...stop it...stop...it...
The next scene is set in San Francisco in 1999, following a group of three Chinese-American teenage boys fleeing someone pursuing them by car. The car corners the boys in a garbage-choked alleyway, but the three of them jump over a chain-link fence, pull out handguns, and then open fire on the driver, who hastily reverses and retreats.
High-fiving each other, the three boys start to walk away down the "safe" part of the alleyway...and then a noise alerts their attention. Gang members rise up from within the piles of trash bags and barrels, brandishing guns. The boys are out of bullets, so all they can do is duck and hide among the bags.
Two of the boys are shot immediately, but one escapes, having hidden behind a few barrels. When he tries to escape, the gang members open fire again, chasing him with bullets across the alley until they corner him up against a brick wall (fittingly, with a mural reading "Visit London" on it). "Say your prayers, Lee," one of the gang members taunts, and they raise their guns.
Suddenly a strange wind fills the alley, too strong to resist; the gang members and Lee all stand motionless and confused, hearing a strange mechanical wheezing noise, until a blue police box appears directly in front of Lee. The gang members immediately open fire on the police box, even though their bullets are ricocheting everywhere--until out steps the Doctor, unaware of the firefight, and he is instantly struck by two bullets, falling to the ground.
The gang members' car (the same one from before) pulls up just at that moment, and the men pile in and drive off, exclaiming "What was that thing?!" Lee runs to check on his friends as soon as it's clear, but at least one of them is already dead. Then he runs to the aid of the Doctor, who is mumbling something about "timing malfunction" and pointing at the door of the TARDIS; unbeknownst to Lee, the Master is slithering his way out of the TARDIS' keyhole.
We follow the ambulance carrying the wounded Doctor in the next scene; Lee is riding beside the Doctor's motionless form, talking with one of the paramedics (later named as Bruce). Lee has to sign paperwork allowing the hospital staff to work on the Doctor, and it is then we learn that it is December 30th, 1999. (Not to mention that Lee marks down the Doctor's name as John Smith, LOL)
Arriving at the hospital, the paramedics rush the Doctor into the building, leaving the ambulance doors open as they hurry the gurney along the hallway to the operation theater. Meanwhile, in the ambulance, the sinuous form of the Master is visible, writhing along the floorboards and finally hiding in a coat sleeve as X-rays are taken of the Doctor's chest to see if the bullets pierced his heart (or hearts, rather). The doctors and nurses dispute over whether the X-rays are accurate, and they finally determine that it was a "double exposure," getting on with the business of removing the bullets from the Doctor's shoulder and leg.
"His heart's still going like crazy."
"Then we'll have to bring in Cardiology."
"Who's on tonight?"
"Amazing Grace."
However, even after the operation to remove the bullets is done, the staff worries about the Doctor's wild heart rate (actually the result of two hearts beating, but they don't believe that yet). So the staff (quoted above) plans to call in their top cardiologist to help get the Doctor's heart stabilized.
The cardiologist in question, Dr. Grace Holloway, is currently out for an evening of opera (specifically, Puccini's Madame Butterfly) with her boyfriend, Brian. When her pager goes off, she hurries back to the hospital, not even taking time to get out of her formal gown before she pulls on her surgical scrubs. The other doctor on staff briefs her on her patient's condition as she sterilizes her hands; Grace is intent on getting to her patient, but a call from Brian stops her in the hallway for a few moments, and they have a brief argument, ostensibly about her leaving the performance early to rush back to work.
In the operation theater, Grace gets ready to use a fiber-optic probe to determine what is causing the Doctor's rapid heart rate, and since she works better with music, she asks for a CD of Madame Butterfly to be played while she works. But the Doctor regains consciousness just before the procedure begins, and begs her not to go through with it, rambling about needing a "beryllium chip" and "I'm not human, I am not like you!" The staff puts him under anesthesia anyway, reassuring him that he's going to be fine.
Above Grace, a group of hospital benefactors are touring the facility with her boss, and they stop to watch her work. But the procedure is not going well; Grace's mental map of the human heart is not matching what she's seeing from the cardiac probe's camera feed. Confused, she begins to pull the probe back out, but it snaps, and the Doctor goes into a violent seizure--soon, his heart rate flatlines, and they try to use the defibrillator to restart his heart as the opera music swells around them. But it's no use. The Doctor screams, then goes unresponsive, and nothing they do can bring him back. The attending nurse notes the official time of death as 10:03 PM.
This is no double exposure...
A shocked and horrified Grace pulls out of her scrubs and demands to see her patient's X-rays. But what she sees in those scans does not comfort her much; she sees the two hearts on the X-ray and is more confused than ever. She only barely pays attention as one of the nurses talks with her about the lack of identification for the Doctor and the few possessions he had with him.
At last, they call Lee in from the waiting room where he's been half-asleep, so that they can break the news of the Doctor's passing gently. Lee pretends he is a friend of the Doctor's, primarily so he can get his hands on the potentially expensive bag of possessions Grace is holding. Grace is no babe in the woods, though, and calls Lee's bluff; Lee's response is to take off as quickly as he can, and despite her chasing him, he escapes into the night with the Doctor's things.
Meanwhile, at Bruce's house, he is sound asleep and snoring his head off (much to his wife's consternation)...but neither of them are aware that the Master has hitched a ride home with him in the sleeve of his work coat, which is draped across the back of a chair in the bedroom. The Master slithers out...