Author's notes:

These first two chapters went really well in my opinion. I'm doing my best to get the personalities of the Tenth Doctor and Donna exactly right and I apollogize if the descriptions are a bit dry, boring or otherwise flawed.

...

Chapter 2: The other side

"Oh, no…" the Doctor muttered. He had seen this happen before. Back when Rose and Mickey were travelling with him.

"Doctor! What the hell just happened?" Donna was, understandably, quite shaken.

"Donna, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," the Doctor said, trying his best to comfort his companion.

"Why, what is it?"

"Well, it's a little complicated but…"

"Yeah?"

"There's a chance that we might be in a place called the Void. The space between realities."

"That's not good, is it?" Donna now had an unpleasant sinking feeling in her stomach.

"Not at all, I'm afraid." Seeing the look of despair on Donna's face, he added, "Although… we could be in an alternate reality, a parallel world. A timeline running alongside ours, but taking a slightly different course."

"That's not so bad, then."

"Either way, there's only one way to find out."

"Open the door?"

The Doctor nodded. They went to the TARDIS' front door.

"Are you ready for this, Donna Noble?"

"Yes."

"Alright, then…" He paused for a moment, before opening the door.

On the other side were trees, lots of trees. The Doctor and Donna stepped out. There was the sound of a busy city nearby.

"That's a relief," said Donna, relieved that they were standing on real, solid ground and not fumbling about blindly in some gaping infinity, "Where and when are we, Doctor?"

"New York. Definitely New York," The Doctor said. He sniffed the air, "Central Park, to be precise. In the early twenty-first century. Wait a tick..." He picked up a twig and, much to Donna's embarrassment, licked it. "Ah, yes, the 22nd of May, 2008, at 5 PM exactly."

"What do we do now?"

"First of all, we've got to fix the TARDIS. I managed it the last time I was trapped in a parallel world. Gave away about ten years of my life for that. Looks like I'll be giving away another ten this time, too."

"I'm sorry to hear that."

"Ah, that's all right. Anyway, I'd better get started." The Doctor went into the TARDIS, followed by Donna. He dug about in the wires under the console and pulled out what looked like a small, blue gem. He blew into the object and it started glowing. He then tinkered about with the console using the sonic screwdriver.

"There we go, that's that problem solved. Unfortunately, we're going to have to wait a while."

"How long?"

"About twelve hours or so."

"Ok." Donna said quietly. She couldn't help but think that something wasn't quite right. She couldn't quite place it. It was just one of those feelings. Gramps would've jokingly told her that it was probably just her mum's cooking, but still this feeling that something wasn't right just wouldn't go away. But she decided to try and ignore it.

However, little did Donna or the Doctor know that that night, something bad would indeed happen. Something very bad…

End of Chapter 2