Chapter One

The Doctor swung underneath one of the gentle, sloping beams of the Tardis and came face to face with blonde haired Rose Tyler.

"Ah, Rose Tyler, I do like you," he said, a smile tugging at the sides of his mouth as he leaned his weight forward, hand gripping the beam. His big eyes searched hers and the two stood locked in a gaze for a moment. He chuckled, admiring her beautiful eyes, "Fancy a trip to Monkif?"

"Monkif?" smiled Rose, leaning in closer to the Doctor, her hands resting on the knees of her jeans. "And where in the whole, wide Universe is Monkif?"

"Ah, well," said the Doctor, stepping back dramatically so his trench coat blew back a bit, "bit closer to Rizexanof then Tamoroo is. Kind of between Montoof and Lanzar. They have great hot dogs there."

"Hot dogs?" giggled Rose, stepping around the beam and closer to the controls of the Tardis, where the Doctor was already flipping switches and turning knobs at a rapid pace. "They have hotdogs somewhere other than earth?"

"Wha…Of course they do!" cried the Doctor, almost offended that Rose wouldn't know such a trivial bit of information. He shot her a confused look, "For goodness sakes, Rose, earth isn't the only place with good lunch food. Grab hold!"

Rose grabbed a handle near the controls just as the Tardis began to shake and bounce, a normal and expected side effect of time travel. She and the Doctor were thrown back simultaneously, and then the Tardis came to a stand still.

"Aha!" cried the Doctor, jumped to his feet, his Converse sneakers making a hard, stomping sound against the deck around the controls. "Welcome to Monkif, Rose! And it's just time for lunch, too! Hot dog?"

Rose laughed, scrambling to her feet, and took the Doctor's hand, "Hot dog."

"Allons-y!" shouted the Doctor as he pulled Rose down the ramp, out the door of the blue police box, and into a bright, colorful new world.

The street that lay before them was wide, busy, and extremely loud. Everywhere there were people calling to each other, laughing, shouting, singing, playing, dancing, working. Everyone wore brilliant, joyful colors, and the sight of black was nowhere in sight save for Rose's jacket. The people looked awfully similar to humans, except for their unusually large heads.

"Not bigger brains," said the Doctor, as he and Rose began down the street, "its just that they have big heads. Their brains are actually smaller then ours, and because of that, it hasn't left any room for them to be sad or angry. Just happy all the time. Rather exciting, actually. Look!" He pointed to a young girl bounding down the street on a pogo stick. It had to have been twenty feet high, and was sending the girl ridiculously high into the air. A long table had been set up down the middle of the street and was decorated with streamers and balloons. Plates of food filled the table from one end to the other, and many people were sitting and eating while others raced about chasing each other and laughing. It reminded Rose very much of a carnival back on earth. Two more pogo sticks bounced by, these two holding teenaged boys.

"Well," laughed Rose, "how about those hot dogs?"

"Hot dogs!" shouted the Doctor. He grabbed Rose's hand and tore off down the street, practically dragging her along behind her. They zigzagged in and out of the massive, colorful array of people, passing no less then six women playing an instrument the Doctor called a timbo, eighteen children joyfully waxing long pogo sticks, and eleven Monkif dogs; exactly like earth dogs, but with bigger heads.

"This is called Holiday Street!" shouted the Doctor above the noise as he pulled Rose along at a steady pace. "They are always celebrating like this here! Other parts of Monkif are much more laid back. Still as happy! But not as loud!"

"How big is this planet?" shouted Rose, skipping a bit as she almost tripped over an abandoned pogo stick.

"Oh, about the size of France!" replied the Doctor, dodging around a man juggling what looked like brightly colored balls of popcorn. "But they can hold their own and nobody wants to attack them! They're too happy to attack! People who try just get frustrated and end up happy, too. Only ones that could possibly do any harm would be Daleks, but they tried once and the Monkif's just put up their shields!"

"What shields!" shouted Rose, relieved to see the end of the street up ahead, as well as the people beginning to diminish into smaller and quieter groups.

"Protection shields around the whole planet," grinned the Doctor, slowing down. He jogged to a stop and caught Rose as she bent over to catch her breath. They both laughed and dropped onto a nearby bench to breathe for a moment.

"That was insane!" laughed Rose, slouching down on the bench and kicking her feet out so her legs were straight. "I've never seen such loud, happy people!"

"They certainly grow on you," giggled the Doctor, imitating Rose's posture. "Glad we got through there as fast as we did. They might have tried to feed us collard greens."

Rose turned her head to see the Doctor and scrunched her face up, "What?"

"Collard greens," he responded, turning to see her, as well. "They love 'em here. Even eat them on their hot dogs."

Rose laughed out loud and stood up, having regained control of her breath. "Well, then," she giggled, "lunch?"

The Doctor leapt up beside her and flashed a huge grin, "Lunch! I know a fine little restaurant! Called The Happy Inn. Just around the corner. Come on!" And then they were running again, away from Holiday Street and into a quieter section of the ever colorful town.

"Are you the Doctor?"

The Doctor spun around, hands in the pockets of his trench coat, and smiled down at the little Monkif before him. "I am at that," he said. "And who are you?"

"Eso," replied the child, a cute smile spreading across her large head. "You are to come with me. It's okay, come along!" Eso turned and began to skip away, her blonde curls bouncing behind her.

"Oh! Hold on, hold on, hold on!" cried the Doctor, hurrying forward and grabbing Eso's shoulders. "Come with you where then, little missy?"

"To see the girl," smiled Eso. She spun around again and started her skipping, humming a little tune to herself and she went along.

The Doctor and Rose cast confused look at each other and then back at little Eso. "Girl?" said the Doctor, "what girl? Hey, Eso! Hang on!" He and Rose ran to catch up to the little on and the Doctor took Eso's arm, "I say, Eso, what girl is this that you're talking about?"

"The girl!" smiled Eso. "I have been following you since you came out of the blue box. You must come see the girl! You must!" Again, Eso turned and skipped away, smiling happily.

"What is she talking about, Doctor?" asked Rose. "How does she know who you are?"

"Well, maybe I've been here before," said the Doctor. "That's the bloody thing about time, you never really know where you've been and what you've done, because you might not have done it, yet."

"What?" asked Rose, but the Doctor was already jogging after Eso. "Doctor!" snapped Rose, exasperated by him ignoring her.

It didn't take long for Eso to bring them to a halt in front of a large, brightly painted house. The street they were on resembled something of a small, quiet street back in England, except all the houses were painted obnoxiously bright colors and the trees had leaves of blue, pink, and lime green. The house Eso had stopped by was a swirled mix of purple and white.

"Here is the girl!" giggled Eso. "Good bye! Good bye!" And with that, she turned and ran away, still humming her happy tune.

"Good bye, Eso!" called the Doctor. "Um, thank you, I suppose? Come along, Rose, let's see what this girl thing is all about, shall we?"

"Is it safe?" asked Rose, taking a wary step back on the dirt road. "Suppose she was paid to bring us here? What if something is waiting in there to kill us…a Dalek maybe!"

"Rose, please," said the Doctor, giving her a sarcastically, exasperated look. "The house is painted purple and the garden is blue, I don't think anything in there is going to kill us, oi?"

"You have no imagination," said Rose, crossing her arms, "I was trying to make it fun."

"Alright, there's a Dalek in there. Let's go kill it," said the Doctor, rolling his eyes, and giving Rose a slight push so she'd start towards the house. He ran up ahead of her on the walk and landed three, solid knocks against the royal blue door. They hadn't waited a second before it was flung open to reveal a woman, head quite large, standing before them.

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