Act 1 ~ Friendly Faces on Friendly Face

The Doctor and Donna stepped from the TARDIS to be pulled into a massive, stirring crowd.

"Oh!" Donna exclaimed, reaching out quickly enough to snatch the Doctor's coattails and follow him through the tremendous, multicolored waves of people.

"Have you seen a friendly face today?" A woman managed to catch Donna and ask her this quickly before she and the Doctor were forced deeper into the crowd.

"Friendly face?" Donna murmured to herself. A hand grabbed hers and at first she was startled, but looked up to see the Doctor facing her.

"There's a break in the crowd just ahead," he cried over the roaring mass of people. Donna nodded, and he squeezed her hand once before pulling her onwards. They finally reached an open space, where they could breathe deep breaths, and couldn't help a little laughter.

"Some landing," the Doctor sighed, and Donna rolled her eyes.

"Next time, let's not get in the middle of a holiday parade, yeah?"

A man standing a few paces away seemed to have heard them. "Excuse me?" he asked, approaching. "Are you offworlders?"

"Tourists, yep, that's us," the Doctor answered.

"I'm Donna, this is the Doctor," Donna put in.

"I could tell you weren't from here," he said, smirking. "My name's Zulu. This isn't a holiday parade—it's the Afternoon Cheer."

The Doctor and Donna did a double-take.

"S—sorry?" Donna asked. "It's like this every afternoon?"

"Why put a break in celebration?" Zulu asked with a broad smile. "The Cheers go on all day, every day."

"No kidding?" the Doctor asked with interest. "That's brilliant! Take every moment, just to celebrate life!"

"There's no reason to see a face that isn't friendly," Zulu grinned. "Please, wear a smile and be happy!"

"Thank you, I will," the Doctor exclaimed graciously. "Now—sorry, do you know any sort of overnight area? R and R, right?"

"Absolutely," Zulu answered, lowering his voice. "You're offworlders, not used to this much noise, I take it? Just take the path marked 'Inner City' just to the north, that way. There's a hotel that offers brilliant accommodations to walk-ins. Called the Happy-Cheer Centre."

"Excellent!" the Doctor exclaimed. "Well, then, c'mon, Donna!"

Donna, who had been standing by with pursed lips as the man spoke, took the Doctor's hand when he offered it to her but gave him a sideways glance as they walked away.

"Notice anything…unusual?" she asked him lowly as they began their walk into the Inner City.

The Doctor furrowed his brow. "Ummm… does the fact that you noticed something unusual count?" he asked.

"I'm just saying, didn't that man seem a bit…too happy?"

The Doctor rolled his eyes. "Donna Noble. Just because we find trouble everywhere we go doesn't mean you have to start looking for it. This is the planet Friendly Face; it's literally the safest place in the galaxy. Low crime rate, good, happy people with high life expectancies—very few diseases here because everybody's nice and clean."

Donna looked about quietly as the Doctor continued.

"You asked for a relaxing weekend, I'm giving you a relaxing weekend—it's Tuesday and Wednesday, too, so you should be pretty grateful. Trust me: nothing can go wrong on Friendly Face, especially not while I'm around."