It's been awhile since I updated, but at least the ideas remain in place-well, most of them, anyway. Sometimes ideas fluctuate around a little bit, and you have to think of new directions to take. I'm considering what to do after this as well, but hopefully it'll all come together well enough. I've had some difficulties working on Buried because a few ideas weren't solid enough...but this is pretty solid, with some minor missteps. On with the show!

14. Gene Wilder

"Not there," Donna Noble muttered to herself, crossing out coffee shop locations on a street map of London as she sat on a park bench near a lamp post in St. James' Park. "And not there either," She said, sighing to herself as she slipped off her shoes to rub the tops of her feet. Her feet were aching after having trudged through half of the city, searching for a place that she had heard of on an online chat room.

A secret group meeting almost weekly to talk of nothing but the Doctor? She had to find out about this, to see if they were legitimate, if it was real, but she had not dared to join in on their conversation, to ask if she could join the group. For one thing, she did not feel like registering with them online until she knew for certain that this was not a prank, or worse, some kind of conspiracy to eliminate people who knew about the Doctor. It was sort of ridiculous, to be so paranoid, but she had to be careful. A lot of crazy stuff was happening out there these days, including the disappearance of Royal Hope Hospital for several hours (apparently on a trip to the moon) and the death of President-Elect Winters (on broad a flying aircraft carrier)-she had to know that she could trust them first.

Which was why she had parked her mum's car on a side street about two hours ago, telling her mum before she left home that she was going on a job hunt, and started scouring the streets. Nothing so far.

"What am I doing wrong? I should have found this place ages ago by now," Donna Noble muttered to herself, scratching out another location. "I got the name and everything else right, didn't I? So why can't I find it? Where the hell is this coffee shop?" She asked.

"If you are asking me, I think you are going about it all wrong," She heard a high baritone voice say, with graceful, melodic low tones, and looked up to see a tall man wearing a dark brown, almost burgundy, frock coat, gray tweed trousers, a Scottish tweed vest, red ascot and floppy bohemian hat, along with the longest scarf she had ever seen of beige, gold, red, blue, gray and green stripes, standing right in front of her. He was holding an odd device, some sort of remote control box that appeared to be cobbled together, and it had a tiny little satellite dish on it that she swore was 'pinging'-what kind of a thing was that? Looked like something the Doctor might create. "It won't come to you that way, if you search for it so hard," He remarked, "Especially if it does not want to be found."

She stared at him at him for a minute. "What?" She asked, unable to say anything else. He had the strangest hairdo that she had ever seen before beneath his hat, some kind of shaggy, curly brown afro that was more suited to the 1970s, or perhaps the bohemians of the 1800s. He also had bug eyes and crooked teeth.

"If you are asking me, I think that you should get up off of that bench," He said, miming her standing, "And take a short walk out of this park, turn right on the next street corner, turn left, turn right again, spin around three times, and then eventually you'll find your destination. It's the way that I always get things done," He said, adjusting something on his remote control. "Perhaps it should be tuned to the centrifugal force of-" He muttered to himself.

"I didn't ask you, Gene Wilder." Donna declared, standing up. That's who he reminded her of, Gene Wilder of the Chocolate Factory, not the Doctor. "I was just asking myself what I had done wrong. I am always doing things wrong."

"Nonsense." The fellow said, adjusting something else. "Nobody does anything wrong, not ever. Well, occasionally they do, but usually they are doing something right, in the sense that they are doing what they were meant to be doing, unless they weren't meant to be doing that-"

"What kind of hippie are you? You're confusing me," Donna said, shaking her head, "And I wasn't talking-what am I doing talking to you here?" She asked.

"Precisely." He smiled, and reached into his frock coat to pull out a paper bag. "Would you like a jelly baby?" He asked, proffering the bag to her.

"No, thank you," She scoffed, pushing the bag away, "I don't know where that thing's been," She remarked. Where had that bag come from? She started to wonder. Were his pockets bigger on the inside, too, like the Doctor's had been?

"It's been around," He remarked, putting the bag away. "I hope you find your particular coffee shop, ma'am, although why should you be searching for a particular coffee shop in the first place?" He asked, staring at her. "There are dozens of coffee shops in the area, of all kinds, so what's so special about this particular coffee shop in the first place?"

"It's a shop, it's just a shop." She said, not willing to tell him more.

"Is it a brand name?" He asked. "I hate people who go in for brand names, allowing themselves to be herded about like sheep. Although those who go in for specialty coffee shops are often just as bad if not worst, elitists who tend to think of themselves as better than anyone else, and so they tend to keep their secrets to themselves." He remarked, turning to her. "They don't want anyone else to spoil their fun. Elitists tend to abuse the system."

"Aren't you being elitist, talking like that?" She remarked.

"I'm not elitist, I'm an outsider, that's different." He responded in kind.

"I don't think-it's just a shop, an ordinary coffee shop of no particular value, so just leave me alone." She said, turning away from him.

"Everything has value." He said. "Everything and everyone."

She paused. "You sound like the Doctor that I met once, last Christmas, the Doctor in his TARDIS." She murmured the last to herself, half turning to him.

"I am the Doctor in the TARDIS," The Fourth Doctor said, straightening himself up. "The definite article," He said, staring at her. "Who are you?" He asked.

"You can't be, you just can't be," She said, laughing as she stared at him and shook her head. "No, the Doctor's different! He's got-shorter hair, sort of prickly straight with sideburns. He wears trainers, Converse, and he wore a brown pinstripe suit when I met him last Christmas, not to mention the fact that he was younger as well, with a different face!" She cried.

"The TARDIS, Time and Relative Dimension in Space, a blue police telephone box similar to what you might see in the 1960s-bigger on the inside than the outside, I imagine?" The Fourth Doctor asked, staring at her.

"Yes, bigger on the inside than the out, and he came from someplace called Gallifrey." She muttered, staring at him. "How do you know that?"

"Because it is my TARDIS, although it might be my future self you are referring to," He said, staring at her. "I haven't met you before now, and I certainly have never looked like the man you are describing, so it is obvious to me that you have met one of my future selves, although if you would be so kind, please refrain from telling me anything more about my future self. I wouldn't like it if you spoiled everything that is going to happen." He said with a smile.

"I don't believe it," She said, shaking her head, "You can't be, he-he could do a lot of amazing stuff with that wonderful machine of his, but change his appearance?" She asked.

"It's not so hard to do," He remarked, touching his face, "Just regeneration—a rejuvenation of every cell in my body, rearranging them into a new order, just when the old cells are dying. It's an easy thing to do for a Time Lord like me, we are practically well known for it—that, and time travel." He grinned.

"Oh, Doctor, am I ever so glad to see you!" She cried, rushing forward to hug him before he had a moment to recover himself. "Even if it is like this." She said, pushing herself away from him, feeling a little awkward now when he was practically a stranger to her at this point, not having met her before. "I've been looking for a place where your friends meet," She said, reaching into her jacket pocket to pull out some folded papers, "A coffee shop, in the area. People like—Yetaxa801-" She said, reading off a screen name.

"Yetaxa?" The Doctor asked, snatching the piece of paper out of her hand, printed off of the chatr-oom website she had visited. "That's Barbara Wright, and—Duchess66? Definitely Polly," He remarked, staring at the names. "I believe that's the Brigadier there, and—who is K9Handler?" He asked himself.

"I don't know, I was going to find out." She said. "Come with me. They are your friends, aren't they?" She asked.

"They certainly are, but-I'm busy at the moment," He muttered, as the pinging on his satellite dish was growing louder. "I was going to find something else…" He nodded, and told her, "You better go-what's your name?"

"Donna, Donna Noble," She said, holding out her hand for him to shake, but he pushed the papers back into her hand instead.

"You better go, Donna Noble, get away from here," The Doctor said, turning away from her and running off in the opposite direction, towards the street. "Search for that coffee shop! And tell them that I am fine!" He called back at her.

"Wait a minute, Doctor!" She cried, running after him instead. "I'm not leaving without you!" She called. "I was searching for you." She told herself.

She left St. James's Park and ran off down the sidewalk after him, for though she had lost sight of him, what with people turning their heads around, and knocked-over stands to mark where he had been, and where he was going, his trail remained fresh enough that she could still trace his path for about an hour. But then the trail grew cold, and she grew tired of running-she couldn't stand it for very long. She was in an industrial park, near the Thames that they had drained last Christmas.

"All right, Doctor," She sighed, panting a little from exertion, "You're not getting rid of me that easily," She muttered, straightening herself up to continue her search.

He was searching for something, the pinging noise had indicated that much, something alien and technological perhaps, a signal of some kind, she thought to herself as she wandered around, somewhere in the general vicinity of this industrial park. So what did he tell her before about not searching for something so hard because it didn't want to be found?

"So think like the Doctor," She said to herself, turning a corner right, turning a corner left, and then turning a corner right again before she spun around three times. In the midst of her dizziness, and feeling sort of stupid, she spotted a dish up on a roof. "That might be it," She said to herself, slowly approaching the place.

"Donna?" She heard the Doctor's voice say behind her, and turned around to see him staring at her in bewilderment from behind the corner of a building. "What are you doing here?" He asked.

"Found ya, sneaker-upper," She said, thumbs up with a grin.

"Donna, get down! Get behind here with me," He said, gesturing frantically as she rushed over to his side, not needing to be told twice. "Foolish girl." He muttered.

"I'm not a girl. So what are we doing here?" She asked, serious now.

"We are tracking-I am tracking-" He emphasized, staring at her, "A signal from this quadrant. The readout is similar to another used by—ssh." He said, covering her mouth even before she said anything. They were still for a moment, until they heard the clomp, clomp, of metal, and witnessed the marching of—

"Robots. Real live robots." Donna breathed with a gasp when he removed his hand. "No more Santas from here on out."

"What?" The Doctor asked, staring at her. "No, they're-Cybermen, I think, although they're different from any Cybermen I have ever seen before," He said, turning around to stare at them, "Like a whole other species of them, although they are quite similar."

"Cybermen?" She asked, staring at their backs. "I think I've heard of them. They were ghosts, but then they became solid, and then-I wasn't around then, I was scuba-diving in Spain, but they were all over the world. From another dimension or something like that."

"Cybermen from another dimension." He frowned to himself. "Odd, that. Donna, you stay here-or better yet, go away." He said, about ready to make a move.

"What? No, I'm-"

"Here," He said, thrusting the remote control device he had been using into her hands. The satellite dish was spinning out of control. "Monitor it." He said, pointing at the display screen. "If it reaches 100, run, run away as fast as you can, I'm warning you, Donna." He said with a shake of his finger. "If you ignore me again, you will be dead."

"All right, okay," She said, taking him seriously. "Sorry. I only wanted to find out-"

"Curiosity will get the better out of you one of these days, Donna, just as it has gotten the better out of me, time and time again," He said, slipping off before she had a chance to say anything more.

"Nutter." She muttered to herself, staring at the display screen on the device; the dial was reaching 78. She grimaced to herself as it inched forward to 80, then fell back to 70, and then inched forward again until it reached 80—the fluctuations remained steady enough, she assumed they were broadcasting some kind of signal to all of the Cybermen. This must be some kind of headquarters for them. She wondered what kind of damage could be caused if it approached—

She felt a hand upon her shoulder. "No!" She cried.

So this can go in several different directions...tune in to the next chapter (or possibly several chapters down the line) to see which direction I took! (Getting all of these different characters together is a task and a half. No way they can do an Eleven Doctors episode on television, I'm afraid to say. Six Doctors might be too much.)