Note: This is placed right before Turn Left. Donna has no idea what's going to happen to her. Oh, and I haven't seen the episode where the Doctor and Rose and Mickey travel to another universe in awhile so please know that I don't really know what I'm saying for the explanation.

Disclaimer: I do not own Doctor Who or any of the characters/references from it. All I own is a copy of a Doctor Who Magazine, a pair of cherries and flowers black converse, and nothing else. Man do I want a trench coat SO badly!

Author's Note #2: For a Christmas present for all those fans out there I'm rewriting the first few chapters, those of which I don't feel the quality of the writing is my best. So, Happy Holidays and happy reading!

The day started out pretty normal. Or as normal as you can get when you're traveling with the Doctor. To the alien beach of Carver, he said. The most beautiful beach in the universe, he said. But what Donna Noble got instead was a trip she never thought she would take: a trip to another universe.

It started out with sparks and a bumpy ride. Sparks and a bumpy ride are nothing unusual when you're riding on a piece of ancient technology, but it was the fact that the Doctor kept saying "Not again! No!" that worried Donna. He's usually in control of the TARDIS. Well not all the time, there was that one time it took them and Martha on a ride to a future human colony. Could that be what's happening again? thought Donna. She had no idea and she couldn't exactly ask the Doctor, who was frantically rushing around trying to do something unknown to her.

All of a sudden, everything stopped, and the lights went out. The space was abruptly filled with a tense silence and an eerie glow which Donna couldn't place the origin. Her heart was pounding in her ears and she stared around wide-eyed. What had just happened?

"No!" cried the Doctor, punching the control panel and breaking the silence.

"What in the world was that?" asked Donna.

"Stupid thing!" said the Doctor, ignoring Donna and kicking the TARDIS.

"Doctor!"

"Ouch! What?" asked the Doctor looking up and holding his injured foot.

"What in the hell just happened?"

"Well," the Doctor said with a sigh as he sat down. "The TARDIS just-just broke down."

"Broke down? The TARDIS can't break down. Wait, can it?"

A wave of worry started to wash over Donna. It can't have broken down. The ship was old, but it was always up and running like its owner. Saying it was broken down was like saying the Doctor was dying of a horrible illness. It just didn't happen.

"It's happened before," responded the Doctor, almost like he was reading her thoughts.

"Happened before? Doctor, why didn't you tell me?"

Donna was in shock. Sure, she knew there were things that he hadn't told her about, but having his ship break down before this moment should be something that he should inform her about. They were completely dependent on this ship. Without, they were stranded.

"I thought it was a onetime thing. Never happened before that. I suppose the TARDIS is just getting old," replied the Doctor, running his fingers through his hair and looking like his 900+ years.

"Isn't there anything you can do?"

"Yeah. There's probably something around here that's still alive. I just have to charge it up and we can go home. It won't take long. I can't believe it happened again!"

The Doctor got up again and started to look at the TARDIS's control panel worriedly. But at the moment Donna wasn't worried about the TARDIS. His words had erased all of her fears about the ship. If the Doctor said it could be fixed, then it could be fixed. She guessed it was silly to fret about the wellbeing of something when the Doctor was around. He was the Doctor after all. Not that some part of her was still bothered by it.

But she ignored that part and was now more worried about how long she was going to be suck here, just waiting for the TARDIS to charge. When the Doctor says something won't take long, it usually does. His sense of time passing was kind of wacked, what with all the time-traveling.

"So how long is charging this thing up, going to take exactly?"

"8 hours at the least. I don't know why it did it again! Maybe it's the distance regulator or the-"

"8 hours!" exclaimed Donna.

The Doctor was great and all, but being stuck in his ship with him for hours on end was not something Donna particularly wanted to do. The Doctor ignored her though and kept babbling on about different things that could be wrong with the TARDIS.

The companion sighed. There was very little chance in shutting him up now, unless something catastrophic occurred. Which by the look of the place, that wasn't going to happen any time soon. She crossed her arms and started to walk around, bored. What was she going to do for 8 hours? Die of boredom probably, thought Donna.

Then her eyes landed on the door of the TARDIS. The Doctor didn't say not to go outside. Maybe there was some interesting alien planet on the other side of the door or something else. Just as long it was something, anything that could take up 8 hours of her time. But when Donna started to walk towards the entrance, she was stopped by the Doctor.

"Don't go outside, Donna. Could be dangerous," commanded the Time Lord not looking up from the control panel, which he was now giving a thro inspection.

"Well, what do you expect me to do for 8 hours?" questioned Donna, hands on her hips.

"I don't know. You'll figure something out."

"Why can't I go outside?"

"Because I said so."

"Who made you the boss of me?"

"Donna just don't."

"It can't be that dangerous," Donna muttered.

And with that she opened the door of the TARDIS. Fresh spring air hit her face as she stepped outside. She looked around. They were in an alley way. There were garbage cans standing empty on the sides, and the bright blue sky looked down on her from above. This place didn't look alien at all. In fact it looked a lot like Earth. But before she could take another step forward, the Doctor showed up besides her.

"I told you not to go outside." He had his hands in his pockets and his face was looking grim.

"What's wrong with it? It even looks like Earth."

"That's because it is Earth."

"Then why didn't you want me to go outside?"

"Because it's not the Earth you know."

"What do you mean?"

The Doctor sighed and beckoned her back inside with him. She could practically feel the wariness coming off him like steam off coffee.

"Come. I'll tell you inside," he said.

"Why not here?" asked Donna, being her usual stubborn self.

"Because I'm not comfortable talking outside, now come on."

Donna frowned. Half of her wanted to stay outside, while the other half wanted to know what the Doctor was talking about. But as always her curiousness trumped her stubbornness, and she followed him inside. The Doctor closed the door behind her and went back up the control panel.

"So?" asked Donna walking up to the Time Lord. She stared at him expectantly, waiting for his promised explanation.

He sighed and then looked at her.

"We're in a parallel universe."

"W-what do you mean? I thought you said that the walls of the universes were closed, that you can't travel between them."

Donna didn't know what she was expecting the Time Lord to say, but she didn't expect him to say this. It was a bomb shell. There were rules of the universe that the Doctor had explained to her a while back. And now he was just contradicting himself. What was going on?

"I know what I said, and right now I'm saying that we're in another universe."

"How? How could've that happen?"

"It's complicated. But basically it happened when the TARDIS broke down. It fell out of space and time and in a parallel universe."

"But-but we'll be able to get home right?" She didn't fancy herself stuck in some unknown universe for the rest of her life.

"I already told you yes."

And with a sigh he turned away from his companion and walked over to the screen, inspecting it intently. Donna followed, know something was up. There was something that he was avoiding telling her.

"I don't know what universe we're in, but obviously one that has Earth in it," the Doctor commented.

"You said that this has happened to you before," Donna added, her curiosity egging her on.

"Yeah. Last time we ended up in a universe with blimps and cybermen. Not what I call a good time," the Doctor replied grimly. Suddenly he smacked the screen to try and get it to work. "Come on!"

Donna knew that he wasn't just striking the screen because it wasn't running properly. There was something else behind his last words. Something he didn't like. She'd known the Doctor long enough to detect some hidden memory. It was the look in his face, in his eyes that told her what it was.

"You were with Rose, weren't you?"

"Come on! Why won't you work?"

Donna knew that meant yes. The Doctor didn't like to talk about Rose. Whenever she came up, he immediately changed the subject. The companion signed, and deciding to give the Time Lord some space and went over to sit down at the bench, considering all her past boyfriends and trying to think of someone that she didn't like to talk about in that same way. So she sat there thinking, and the Doctor stood there thinking as Earth but not really Earth sat just outside the door.