A/N:- I'M ALIIIIIIIVE!

Am vair sorry! I know, 'tis been ages and waaaaay too long since I've uploaded anything! But YESHES, I managed to coax my Vati of his precious Windows XP installation disc and now me has new and (hopefully) improved windows!! YAYZEE! On the other hand, I have to utterly, completely, positively, quackily, definitely REDO my entire profile. 'Tis all been wiped outtt! *sobs*

Big mugs and thanksies for your specspatula reviews!

Disclaimer: If I owned Pushing Daises, Digby would get the main part!! And as for Doctor Who… Well, Simon Cowell would be my master villain + I'd force DT to staaaaaaaaay. Heehaw!

WARNING: Lotsa dialogue, consisting of pointless blathering on…

=D (Ooh and un-betaed.)

Deductions, Spacemen, And A Dog Named Digby

The facts were these. The dog named Digby, not only found himself blindly tumbling down a hole, but was exposed to knowledge that left most dogs still wondering. One: - much to Digby's disapproval - cartoon animations, where the beloved pink rabbit or two often found himself or herself walking on thin air, on the invention called the television, were not to be trusted. Two: he really did not understand humans, and their strange tradition of falling down conveniently placed holes. In fact, it confused Digby very much.

One Private Eye, one Itty Bitty, one Time Lord, and one mound of fur by the name of Digby, soon comprehended the fact that gravity was not a very friendly force, once coming to terms with unexpected, gaping, black holes in the floor, and shortly found themselves plummeting down a chasm of pitch-black darkness.

OOF! All five collapsed into a large, lumpy heap of human and dog, onto the sand-covered ground. A large, brown cloud of dust enveloped them, as they each vainly struggled to untangle themselves from one another… in the dark.

"Everyone OK?" an authoritative voice asked, as they'd all seemingly to have risen up from the heap on the floor – well, sand, on this occasion.

"Yep."

"Yeah."

"Woof!"

"Good. First thing's—"

"OW! Whose dumb idea was it to step on my best sneakers?"

"Oh 'ello, Digby, what've you got— MY SHOES!"

"MY SHOES!"

"I think that was me! Bit dark, if you haven't noticed."

"…Cos that dumb idea won't be very happy, when I find out— Wait. Who said that?!"

"Me."

"Good dog! Remind me to--"

"Me? Who's me?!"

"ME!" a feminine voice shouted.

"What d'you mean that's--"

"THE LOCHNESS MONSTER!!" the man who was supposedly the Doctor yelled.

"THE LOCHNESS MONSTER!" His voice bounced off the cavern walls.

"Always wanted to do that," the Doctor muttered, grinning goofily, to himself.

Everybody stopped in their tracks, and froze in the darkness. Two "WHAAAAAT?!"s and "WOOF!" followed.

"Shhh!" the man yelled again. "Sorry. Just wanted your attention. Can anybody hear that?"

"Hear what?"

"Hear what?" a voice echoed back.

"That!"

"That!" boomed the echo.

"EVERYBODY SHUT UP!"

"Everybody shut up!"

"From now on, everybody just whisper."

"Digby," a female whispered, feeling something soft and furry, "it's either you've grown five feet tall, or— Oh. It's just a coat."

"It's not just any coat," possibly the Doctor cut in cheerily, as a lean figure ducked down to fumble with his feet. "Janis Joplin gave it to me!"

"I don't care if the Lochness Monster gave it to you. I just wanna know where the hell we are, 'cos it certainly ain't up there, in the museum." The man breathed, and translated his snappy ramble, "We need some light."

"Good thinking! Light. Light, light, light, light— of course! The Sonic Screwdriver!"

Some fumbling and mutters later, a small buzz in the air filled the air and a small blue light was produced, from a long, pen-like device. The Doctor exclaimed a triumphant "Ha!", as the light shone brighter, and the area surrounding them was basked in an illuminating, sapphire blue.

The blueish, light-tinted faces of Emerson, Olive, the Doctor, and Digby soon became clearly visible. But, the colour of their clothes and faces stood out like sore thumbs against the bleak, brown dullness enclosing them.

"So?" Olive enquired softly, "Where are we?"

"Weeeeell," the Doctor began, his eyes swiftly swimming over the vast underground cavern they appeared to be in, "it seems to me, that we're trapped. And ooh, about forty, fifty feet underground, maybe?"

"Or, in somebody's secret passageway," Emerson said decisively.

"Oh, what makes you think that?" the Time Lord asked, perplexed.

The Private Investigator grinned smugly, as some short distance away from them, Digby barked down a tunnel which was slightly hidden behind a mound of rocks.

"Eh?" a pensioner said, in bewilderment, staring form his rotten apple in his hand, to the empty space behind the red ropes.

"Where'd they go?!" a random person in the crowd yelled.

"Olive? Emerson? Digby?"

"Down the hole, of course!" another random, yet smarter person piped up. "There must be a trap door around there somewhere, and there must be a form of trigger to--"

"Shu'p clever clogs!" Mad Miriam snapped back.

The crowd subsequently broke out into loud shouts of conversation.

"MEH!" someone shouted, above the others. "Accept it! Show's over! Let's just go wild, and carry on browsing shoes like loons! C'MON GUYS!"

"Well, what do you say, random scientist man?"

"Well, they do say it may be the last exhibiting we may do for a while, and there is the perceptibly plausible chance of there being a shoe apoca--"

"SHOEEEEEEEEES!"

And the once-mob, now-crowd were off.

A submissively successful silence later …

"Rickoji speaking Rickoji's language! YOU speaking Rickoji's language! ALL BODIES SPEAKING RICKOJI LANGUAGE!" the little alien squeaked decisively, making a noise which could only be translated as a stubborn "harrumph".

Donna and Rose stared at each other, both knowledgably biting back laughter, at the absurd cuteness of the strange, little alien. Confused and perplexed, Ned stared at the alien, still not quite able to believe the fact that the green and purple thing, before his eyes, very much existed. But, if truth be told, the Pie Maker had just about given up debating with the alien.

"Rickoji…" the alien began, but was cut off by the quiet, but audible sound of a phone ringing.

Feeling the vibration in her pocket, Donna rolled her eyes, murmured an irked apology, and removed the mobile from its resting place.

What?! With a frown, she looked to Rose – one hand fiddling with an earring, the other hand hanging loosely down her side, and then back to the four blatant words flashing on the screen of her mobile. Rose, the screen read. This was not making sense. Rose was, as far as she could see, not in any contact whatsoever with her pockets, or her phone, yet Rose was calling her? Right.

'Best get it over and done with,' Donna thought, as the phone continued to ring.

Excusing herself out of the area, Donna walked over to a quiet corner in the shoe exhibit room and answered the call.

"Hello?" she said.

"Donna!" a voice half-whispered, back at her.

Doctor?!

"What?! Why've you got Rose's phone for?"

"It fell out of her pocket, I picked it up," the Doctor defended quickly – and quietly. A little too quickly, in fact. The Time Lord could practically hear Donna's silent sceptism. "What?! It did!"

"Sure. And don't tell me, I s'pose you 'forgot' to give it back to her, did you?" Donna smirked.

"Yeap. You read my mind! That's exactly what I was gonna say! You know, you should really go to the planet Mens Lectio – they're an planet entirely made out of mind readers from all across the Universe. Bit corrupt and been in a permanent recession for most of its days, but… anyway!" the Doctor babbled. Who knew he could still talk as fast and as mad, even when talking in a hushed whisper! "Whenever they're hired to… well, read minds they have to travel around in these dinky, little space pods! They're painted with green and blue polkadots! Polkadots! How brilliant is that?! Very! So, how 'bout it, Donna? You get three thousand Odutolas per job! Which is only… ooh… 9.869655 pence in British pounds, but you never know…" Donna swore she could hear the Doctor's grin. "It'd suit you!"

"You'd better watch it, Spaceman!"

"Do I take that as a yes or a no?" the Doctor mumbled cheekily.

"No! I'd slap you one, if you were here."

"I bet…"

"What'd you say?!"

"Nothing, nothing."

"Get on with it, then: why're you calling? No, never mind that - why're you whispering?" Donna enquired, dropping her voice to a whisper for the latter part.

"Ah, yes. Almost forgot. Anyway. Digby, Emerson, Olive, and I are trapped 50 feet below the museum, in an underground cavern of some sort."

"How the hell did you…"

"Don't ask. No, really, don't. It's a long story."

"We fell down a hole!" the familiar voice of one Emerson Cod answered loudly, in the background.

"And, guess what!?"

"What?" Donna asked, unenthusiastically.

"I got my shoes back! You know my red Converses, with the--"

"Get on with it. Wait, when did you lose your--"

"Now, I need you or Rose, or both of you, to go back to the TARDIS. I need you to use the scanner to track the Sonic Screwdriver's location, and bring a map up of Papen County's underground network. See what you can find--"

"But, how? This is the TARDIS we're talking about. Everything'll be in Martian!"

"Gallifreyan," corrected the Doctor.

"Yeah, Gallifreyan, then. In case you haven't noticed, Doctor, me an' Rose aren't exactly Time Lords. Ladies. Whatever."

"Just… ask politely."

"Ask politely. You want us – me - Rose, to just ask politely?!"

"Yep. That's what I said. I keep telling ya, the TARDIS gets inside your head! She's a living being. Like you, or me. Weeell, to be specific, when I say like you or me, what I really mean is me - seeing as TARDISes were grown on Gallifrey and I'm Gallifreyan, well Time Lord, but you get what I mean. But… then again, when I say "me", what I actually mean is--"

"I'm on it," Donna cut in, not waiting for an answer, and summarily snapping the phone shut.

Whilst one Donna Noble was absent…

A small silence followed, as they quietly watched the alien quite happily hop up, cut out, and 'collect' the shoes from their pristine glass encasements.

A purple laser was produced. "Rickoji LOVE shoes." A circle of glass was cut out. "Rickoji COLLECT shoes. Rickoji NEED shoes."

"So you, what, steal shoes for a living?" Rose said, her forehead creasing, as she started to take tentative steps closer to Rickoji.

"Giant wrong! Rickoji COLLECT shoes!" the alien corrected, persistently.

"Technically speaking - everything we take or obtain, download or facsimile, without paying or granted the owner's permission - is basically classed as 'stealing'," Ned amended.

"Rickoji only COLLECT! Rickoji no steal. Stealing baaaaad! Giants no making sense!"

"If ya don't mind, we do have names: I'm Rose, an' this is Ned." Rose introduced themselves, Ned nodding, as the girl named Rose gestured him. She jerked a thumb behind her shoulder. "And that was Donna."

"Roooose. Neeeed. Donnaaaa," the alien repeated. "Preeeetty names." He shook his head, and continued his work: the pile of shoes growing rapidly, as the alien's work pick up its pace. "Rickoji collect shoes. Rickoji work fast. Rickoji finish collect and go, before Rickoji hear giants scream."

A little hesitantly, Ned asked, "Where do you keep the shoes? After you've 'collected' them, I mean."

"Rickoji know secret, Rooooss and Need do not!" Rickoji giggled, in a gurgly sing-song voice .

"You don't happen to 'ave a spaceship, do you?" quizzed Rose, curiously.

"Spaceships like the tiny blue box, that disappeared from the Pie Hole's back alley, which all three of you couldn't possibly fit in without being remotely intimate?" Ned said to Rose.

"How did you--" Rose shook her head. "I won't even ask. But, yeah," she breathed out.

"Rickoji has spaceship! Rickoji has biiiiig spaceship!" Rickoji chirped. "In pocket!"

Ned and Rose looked to each other. Despite the doubtful looks of the Londoner and the Pie Maker, young Rickoji dipped a hand down into the folds of his bare purple skin and pulled out a small, green, golf ball sized object. Disbelief floated through the air.

Ned blinked twice in succession, before he looked from the impossibly existing alien standing before him to the impossibly small object in its hands.

"That's… your spaceship," Rose said disbelievingly.

"Rickoji spaceship! Rickoji spaceship!"

"S'bit small, ain't it?"

"No small! No small! Rickoji ship BIG. Rickoji must wait."

"A bigger spaceship, that can hold twenny-odd-thousand shoes?" she tried again.

"No. Rickoji; one ship. But Rickoji ship not small; Rickoji ship biiiiig! BIIIG! Rickoji's ship need recharge first. Rickoji's ship need grow biiiiig. Then Rickoji flyyyy! FLYYY! Rickoji collect shoes, while wait."

"An' how long does the recharging take?"

"Three six five!"

"Three six five minutes? Three six five weeks? Three six five hours?"

"A year!" Ned chipped in, explaining, "There are 365 days in a year – not counting the leap. Three. Six. Five."

"Good thinking, Ned," Rose commented. She squinted, arched an eyebrow, and took a wild guess. "You use shoes to recharge?"

Suddenly, the alien looked aghast. "NO! Shoes like sacred being to Rickoji. Shoes is tradition. Shoes is what Giants call 'hobby'. Shoes for collection. Not fuel."

Ned furrowed his brow. "But, you've got the whole planet--" Ned glanced at the alien. "--universe to steal shoes from, yet Papen County's missing shoe rate is going up and up. Higher than any other American city's missing shoe rate. Higher than any country or city's missing shoe rate. There are lots of other countries and cities to choose from. Norway, for example. Not pinpointing Norway for personal reasons, like Nils Nilsen, of course." Ned took a deep breath. "So, why are you stealing most of the shoes from Papen County?"

Hugging the ever-growing pile of shoes, which – quite funnily enough – no persons by the names of Ned and Rose were attempting to prevent from increasing, Rickoji laughed. In fact, Rickoji laughed a thick, gurgling laugh which had quite the capability of causing a mass avalanche with.

"This place shoes are many! Many shoes to choose! Variety. Strange shoes. Crazy shoes. Tall shoes. Spiiiiky shoes. Converse. Rocket dog. Hush puppy. This place hold shoe exhibition! Famous people shoes! Lotsa lotsa famous Giant shoes! Rickoji like famous Giant, like Kreira Kitelady! Rickoji also like smell of Deflectors! Deflectors naaaiiiiiice smell."

Keira Knightley? Rose thought to herself.

"Deflectors." Rose's lips sunk into a frown. "But I've heard that word before."

"Everybody's heard of Deflectors, nobody's not hear do Deflectors. they're the talk of the town. I don't think there's anybody in the whole of Papen County, that doesn't," Ned rambled, long-windedly. "It's a practically a crime, on its own, not knowing what Deflectors are. You'd get lynched and mobbed and mocked, for the rest of your life, for not knowing of them." The Pie Maker's eye twitched slightly; his lips mistaken for a ventriloquist's, as they formed the words, "And Emerson owns a pair."

Why was she so thick today? Of course they were a brand of shoes. They were talking about shoes and brands, that entire time! It was a infamous brand of shoes. A brand of shoe. A simple brand of shoes. Nothing else. Just a shoe brand, right? Then why did it prod her in the back, and insist that it rung a bell? Why, also, did the simple solution that it was a shoe brand not satisfy the hunger of her mind, and rumble determinedly for more?

"That's not it… There's somethin' else. Somethin' we've missed." And that was when she noticed Rickoji abstractedly gnawing on a multicoloured shoelace.

Images began to flash through her mind. Posters. Missing trainers. Rickoji the shoe "collector". Murder. Death by shoelaces. No shoes. Paris. It suddenly all made sense.

"You killed him…"

DUN-DUN-DUN! SOOOO… Rickoji killed Paris! Or did he? Zat is ze kestion mon petit pallys! Oh, but you already know the answer! =P

Sozzes, couldn't thinkies of a way to fit Chuck in! But no fear, she be in next chappie! Up… Tuesday?!?!?!?!?

Am luurving reviews/feedback. They're really VAIR nutritious for the rubber duckies!