The Empty Child ( TV story ) The Empty Child was the ninth episode of first series of BBC Wales " Doctor Who " . It was the first part of a two - part story , and writer Steven Moffat ' s first episode of " Doctor Who " . Furthermore , it introduced Captain Jack Harkness into the " Doctor Who " universe . The idea of alien interference during the second World War would be revisited later in the Eleventh Doctor story " Victory of the Daleks " " . " It ' s the first of the Revived Series to have a child being responsible for the bizarre goings - on in the episode , due to gaining some kind of extraterrestrial powers . This pattern would be repeated in future stories such as " Fear Her " " " and " Night Terrors . " Synopsis . Chasing a metallic object through the Time Vortex , the Ninth Doctor and his companion , Rose Tyler , arrive in London during the Blitz . While Rose meets " Captain Jack Harkness " , the dashing Time Agent responsible for bringing the object , the Doctor finds a group of homeless children terrorised by Jamie , an " empty " child wearing a gas mask . Plot . The Doctor ' s TARDIS chases a metal cylinder displaying mauve alert , which prompts Rose to ask why they are chasing it . The Ninth Doctor explains that mauve is the universally recognised colour for danger , and that " red ' s camp " — only human s considered red a colour for danger . " Oh all those red alerts . All that dancing , and misunderstanding " the Doctor says , reflecting back to when he didn ' t know this . The Doctor hacks into the flight program of the cylinder and keeps the TARDIS locked on it . However , the cylinder begins jumping time track s . Coming out of the vortex , they find the cylinder is thirty seconds from the centre of London . The TARDIS materialise s in a narrow alley between some brick buildings at night . The Doctor and Rose step out in search of the object ; the Doctor notes they have arrived a couple of weeks to a month after the cylinder ' s impact — it was jumping time tracks , which made it hard to keep up . He hears music coming from behind a locked door and uses the sonic screwdriver to open it . He steps inside , but Rose hears a child calling for his mother . She looks up and sees a young boy wearing a gas mask on the roof . The door the Doctor enters leads to a makeshift cabaret . After the singer ends her set , the Doctor steps up to the microphone and asks if any object had fallen from the sky in the last few days . Everyone laughs , and the Doctor finally spots posters showing that it ' s 1941 — the middle of the Blitz — and closes his eyes in embarrassment . In the meantime , Rose has reached the roof of the building where the young boy is standing on a cargo container . A rope dangles in front of her . She uses it to climb up , not realising that it is attached to a barrage balloon above . It rises , taking Rose clean off the roof and hanging on for dear life . Rose sees bits of the city of London in flames , spotlights sweeping through the sky , the sound of anti - aircraft fire and bombers flying right at her . The Doctor returns to the TARDIS and sees no sign of Rose . Petting a stray cat , the Doctor rather sarcastically remarks that one day , he ' ll get a companion that actually does what he says . He pulls up short when the exterior telephone of the TARDIS rings ; it ' s not a real phone . He prepares to examine it with the sonic screwdriver when a young woman appears and tells him not to answer it . The Doctor asks her how the telephone can be ringing , but when he turns back she has disappeared . He picks up the earpiece , but all that comes through is a child ' s voice asking , " Mummy ? Are you my mummy ? " several times before it falls dead again . Hearing clattering down the alley , the Doctor looks over a wall into a residential garden and sees a woman ushering family into an air - raid shelter . He also spots the young woman he saw moments before entering the house . Once inside , she begins to raid the cupboards for tinned food . Rose is still hanging by a rope over a blazing London . From a balcony below , a man dressed in RAF uniform peers through binoculars up at her . A British Army officer addresses him as " Jack " and asks if he is going to the shelter , but Jack is distracted by the sight of Rose ' s bottom in his sights . Jack mutters , " Excellent bottom " , and grins at the officer , before saying ( with an American accent ) , that he has to meet a girl , " but you ' ve got an excellent bottom too . " Rose loses her grip on the rope and falls , screaming , until she finds her descent halted by a blue beam . Jack ' s voice tells her to deactivate her mobile phone and to keep her limbs inside the light field as she slides rapidly down the beam into Jack ' s ship and his arms . Rose stares at the handsome Jack and gets out a couple of " hellos " before she faints . Back at the house , the young woman has been joined by other children . They start to eat the dinner left on the table . The Doctor appears suddenly and deduce s that all of them are homeless , but notes that , as it is 1941 , they should have been evacuated to the country long ago . The children say that they were , but they returned to London for various reasons . Nancy , the young woman who told him not to answer the phone earlier , finds them food this way , waiting for families to hide in shelters before stealing their food . The Doctor thinks it a great idea , but isn ' t sure if it ' s " Marxism in action or a West End musical " . The Doctor asks the children if they have seen the cylinder , drawing them a picture , but before any can answer , there is knocking on the window , accompanied by a child ' s voice asking for its mother . Outside is a child in a gas mask . He wanders over to the front door , repeating his query . Nancy hurriedly bolts the door before he can get in . Nancy tells the Doctor that he is " not exactly " a child , and then orders the other children to leave by the back way . The child sticks his arm through the mail slot ; he has a strange scar on his hand . Nancy tells the Doctor not to let the child touch him or he will become just like him — empty . The telephone on the mantelpiece rings . When the Doctor picks it up to hear the same plaintive request for its mother , Nancy grabs the receiver and hangs up . The child has the ability to make telephone calls . The Doctor asks the child through the door why the other children are frightened of him , but he keeps asking to be let in , saying he is scared of the bombs . The Doctor agrees to open the door , but when he does , the street is empty . Rose wakes up in Jack ' s ship , which she says is very " Spock " , a reference he does not understand . He introduces himself as Captain Jack Harkness , an American volunteer with No . 133 Squadron RAF . He hands her an identification card which Rose identifies as psychic paper — it shows her whatever he wants her to see , which is apparently that he is single and works out . To Rose ' s embarrassment , Jack reads the paper as showing that Rose has a boyfriend but considers herself " very " available . Jack uses his ship ' s nanogene s to treat Rose ' s hands for rope burns . He also tells her to stop acting , he can spot a " Time Agent " a mile away and had been expecting one to turn up . Jack invites her for a drink on the " balcony " ; opening the hatch , they step out onto the invisible hull of the ship , floating next to Big Ben . Nancy makes her way across an abandoned rail yard to a locomotive , where she unloads the tins she took from the house . The Doctor surprises her again , having followed her . He has made the connection between the fallen cylinder and the empty child . Nancy tells him about a bomb falling near the Limehouse Green station " that was not a bomb " . It is now guarded by soldiers and barbed wire . Nancy says if he wants to find out what is going on , he needs to talk to " the doctor " . On top of his ship , Jack and Rose continue to flirt . He tells her that he has something the Time Agency might want to buy and asks her if she is empowered to negotiate . Rose plays along , saying that she should talk to her " companion " first . He tells her that what fell on London was a fully equipped Chula warship — the last of its kind — and offers to get it for her if the Agency names the right price . However , the deadline for a decision is in two hours — because that is when a German bomb will fall and destroy it . He proceeds to look for her " companion " by scanning for alien technology . Rose gives an approving smile — the Doctor had earlier refused to do just that . The Doctor uses his own binoculars to monitor the crash site from afar with Nancy . She encourages him to go speak to the doctor at nearby Albion Hospital . The Doctor remarks that Nancy is looking after the children to make up for something and she admits that it is because her brother Jamie died during an air raid . In the wards , the Doctor finds the beds apparently filled with corpses wearing gas masks . An elderly man in a doctor ' s coat appears . He tells the Doctor that there are hundreds of them . Dr Constantine invites the Doctor to examine the masked people , warning him not to touch their flesh . The Doctor finds that , impossibly , all of them have identical injuries to the skull and chest cavity . The gas masks are also seemingly fused to their flesh , although there are no burns or scarring . They also have lightning - shaped scars on the backs of their hands . Constantine has the same scar , but the Doctor does not notice . Constantine explains that when the " bomb " dropped , it claimed one victim . Those in contact with it soon suffered the exact same injuries , the symptoms spreading like a plague . The Doctor asks what killed them . Constantine responds by telling him that they are not dead . When he raps his cane against an empty pail the " corpses " come to life . The Doctor takes a startled step back , but Constantine tells him they are harmless : they just sit there . They have no life signs , but they do not die . All Constantine can do is make them comfortable . Constantine states that before the war , he was a father and a grandfather ; now he is neither , but still a doctor . The Doctor , having been through a similar experience , tells Constantine that he know what it ' s like . He suspects the Army has a plan to blow up the hospital and blame it on a German bomb , as isolated cases are now breaking out all over London . He directs the Doctor to Room 802 , where the first victim , Nancy ' s brother , was housed . Constantine says that Nancy knows more than she is saying but before he can say anything else , he grabs his neck and starts to choke out the words , " Are you my mummy ? " Before the Doctor ' s eyes , Constantine ' s features shift and change into a gas mask , as he slumps in his chair . Rose and Jack enter the hospital . Jack introduces himself to the Doctor , calling him " Mr . Spock " , to the Doctor ' s puzzlement . Rose privately tells the Doctor that she had to tell Jack they were Time Agents and give him a false name . She tells the Doctor about the Chula warship . The Doctor demands to know from Jack what kind of warship it is , but Jack insists that it has nothing to do with the plague . Jack confesses that the cylinder was just an ambulance — an empty shell which he was trying to pass off as valuable . Jack realises now that Rose and the Doctor are not really Time Agents . The Doctor explains that human DNA is being rewritten by an idiot — but for what purpose ? Back at the house , Nancy has returned to raid the kitchens , but the child gets inside . She does her best to hide , but the child eventually finds her in the dining room and asks her , " Are you my mummy ? " Nancy backs away , calling the child " Jamie " and pleading , " But you ' re dead ! " In the hospital the gas - mask virus carriers suddenly get up and start advancing on the trio of time travellers , all calling for " Mummy " . . .