'Turn Left' (Story Code 4.11) by Russell T. Davies

“There’s something on your back!” – Alice Coltrane

”Donna Noble – you’re the most important person in the whole of creation!” – Rose Tyler

The Doctor and Donna are on the Chino-Planet Shan Shen, enjoying all the delights that its oriental-style market streets have to offer. While the Doctor haggles with a trader, Donna wanders off and meets a fortune teller, who offers to read her future for free. However, as the woman begins reading Donna’s palm she seems more interested in her client’s past – and as Donna suddenly begins experiencing flashbacks, something scuttles out of the shadows behind her... When the fortune teller’s talk turns to choices made, Donna finds herself recalling the moment when she was driving to her interview at H.C. Clements, accompanied by Sylvia, her mother, who was trying to convince her to visit Mr Choudry regarding a job with his photocopying business instead; at the time Donna turned left at a crossroads, a path that eventually led her to meet the Doctor; but as the unseen creature crawls onto her back, Donna suddenly finds herself back in the car – and this time she turns right…

Christmas Eve: Donna is down the pub with her girlfriends, celebrating the festive season and the fact that she has just been promoted to Mr Choudry’s personal assistant. Donna’s jubilation is only slightly marred by her friend Alice, who thinks she can see something terrible on Donna’s back… When a man bursts into the pub talking excitedly of a “Christmas Star” in the sky, Donna and her friends rush outside to see; overhead, the Racnoss Web Star flies past – and then starts sending down bolts of energy that decimate the population. As the army arrive in tanks and open fire on the ship Donna runs in terror towards the Thames, which has somehow been completely drained of water; here she overhears a U.N.I.T. soldier radioing in a report concerning someone called ‘The Doctor’, who drowned beneath the river while defeating a giant alien spider. As Donna looks on, soldiers load the corpse of a man into their jeep… Donna then meets an attractive blonde girl, who becomes distraught after learning of the Doctor’s death; the girl also stares at Donna’s back, before vanishing into thin air. Some time later, Donnas is furious to learn that she has been sacked from her P.A. job; Mr Chroudry is apologetic: the draining and closure of the Thames has badly affected his business. Launching into a tirade against her colleagues Donna begins packing; at that moment the ground shakes; looking outside, the office staff see a huge rainstorm over the Royal Hope Hospital; seconds later, the entire hospital vanishes. Back home with her mother and grandfather, Donna watches a news report on the dramatic return of the hospital; the lone survivor, medical student Oliver Morgenstern, recounts how his colleague Martha Jones gave her life to ensure he had the last oxygen tank, while freelance journalist Sarah Jane Smith died after preventing a catastrophe with the M.R.I. machine, along with her son Luke and friends Maria Jackson and Clyde Langer. Leaving for fish and chips, Donna sees the blonde girl reappear in a blaze of white light; recognising Donna, the girl warns her to leave London this Christmas, telling her to go on the holiday that she will win with the raffle ticket she took from work. Donna becomes defensive, warning the girl to stay away from her as she storms off. Weeks later, after winning first prize as the girl predicted, Donna arrives at the country hotel with Shirley and Wilf, ready to enjoy their Christmas break. After spending the night crammed into one room, they awake on Christmas morning ready to enjoy the day – but then the maid arrives and instantly sees a ‘spider’ on Donna’s back. Standing in the bathroom between two mirrors, Donna catches a glimpse of something, but is then distracted by a television newsflash, which reports that a huge replica of the Titanic is falling from the sky, heading straight for Buckingham Palace. As the report suddenly cuts out, the ground shakes; looking outside, Donna, Wilf and Shirley see a huge mushroom cloud where London once stood – the entire city has been destroyed… With the whole of Southern England flooded with radiation, the Social Services begin evacuating the population; Donna and her family are sent to Leeds, where they find themselves billeted in a terraced house along with two other families. As they cram themselves into their makeshift room in the kitchen, Wilf talks of the ‘Wartime Spirit’, believing that the £50 billion in aid from America will soon put things right; however, their hopes are soon dashed when the news reports that sixty million Americans have suddenly dissolved into fat, transformed into strange little creatures; the skies over America are now filling with huge spaceships, that are taking the billions of creatures away. As Donna and her mother ponder their future, raucous singing from the next room disturbs them; Donna goes to complain, only to find that her grandfather is leading the Italian and Indian families in song. Donna and her mother join in, but are soon interrupted by the sound of gunfire on the street; heading outside they find soldiers firing at parked cars – the ATMOS devices in each vehicle have started belching toxic fumes into the atmosphere. One of the soldiers sees something on Donna’s back, but when he raises his gun and orders her to turn around there is nothing there. Seeing a white flash down the street, Donna investigates, and once again encounters the blonde girl. Heading for a park bench, the girl explains that the ATMOS devices are alien in origin; looking up to the night sky, she and Donna see a huge explosion; the girl tells Donna that a team called Torchwood has just destroyed the Sontaran spaceship: Gwen Cooper and Ianto Jones bravely gave their lives, while their leader, Captain Jack Harkness, has been teleported to the Sontaran homeworld. The girl then tells Donna that it should have been the Doctor who saved the world; Donna was to have travelled with him, after saving his life during his fight with the Empress of the Racnoss, but somehow history was changed. The girl goes on to explain that she has been pulled across from an alternate universe, and that all the parallel worlds in existence are in danger from ‘The Darkness’; she then asks Donna to come with her, but Donna refuses, insisting she is nothing special, just an office temp. Telling Donna that she will join her soon, but will also die in three weeks’ time, the girl vanishes before her eyes… Later, Donna and her family bid goodbye to the Colasanto family, as soldiers take them away to a labour camp for immigrants. That night, Donna sits with Wilf in his allotment, looking through his telescope; they are both shocked when they suddenly see all the stars start to go out – the Darkness has come. Turning round Donna sees the girl again, and this time she agrees to go with her. U.N.I.T. soldiers drive Donna and the girl to a military building, where Captain Nareesa Magambo shows Donna an object they salvaged from beneath the London docks: an old, battered police box. Stepping inside, Donna is astounded to see that its interior is massive; the girl explains that the box is called the TARDIS; it belonged to the Doctor, who was the last of the Time Lords, and although dying, it is still trying to help. The girl then shows Donna a circle of mirrors, which has been constructed using technology scraped from the TARDIS’ surface; with the ship powering this technology Donna is finally able to see what is on her back, as a giant, horrible, black insect becomes visible. As Donna panics the girl tries to calm her down, explaining that the evil creature on her back feeds by changing time, feasting off the energy of events that never happened – in this case, the history that should have happened when Donna turned left instead of right. Donna desperately asks for the alien creature to be removed, but the girl tells her this is impossible, as the beetle is in a state of flux. When the girl insists that Donna is the most important person in the world, as both she and the Doctor were supposed to stop the stars from going out, Donna asks what she can do to help; the girl tells Donna that they can use the circle of mirrors – the time machine that she has been using all along – to send Donna back to Monday 25th to ensure she makes her earlier self turn left. Donna agrees, knowing that by putting history back on track she will make a better world; however, as she stands in the circle she is dismayed to learn from the girl that she is still destined to die. The time machine activates and Donna is enveloped in a white light storm; she then finds herself back on that fateful day – but half a mile away from her past self, with only four minutes to go. As Donna breaks into a run, her earlier self sits at the crossroads, and once again her overbearing mother talks her into turning right. Knowing that she won’t reach herself in time, Donna realises that she has only one choice, and she bravely steps into the path of an oncoming lorry; the driver brakes, but his vehicle hits Donna straight on. When the cars behind immediately start backing up, Donna’s earlier self stops turning into the traffic jam and instead turns left. As Donna dies, the blonde girl appears and whispers two words in her ear, a message for the Doctor. History then returns to its proper path, and Donna finds herself back in the fortune teller’s booth on Shan Shen; the evil beetle on her back convulses and falls to the ground dead, while the terrified fortune teller flees in panic. Joined by the Doctor, Donna is overjoyed to see her friend alive once more, and excitedly tells him of her experiences. Having determined that the insect was one of the Trickster’s brigade the Doctor muses on all the coincidences surrounding Donna – pondering on how something is binding her life to his. Recalling the mysterious blonde girl, Donna recounts her talk of the Darkness and parallel worlds; with mounting unease, the Doctor asks the girl’s name; Donna doesn’t know, but she does remember the two words she said: “Bad Wolf”. Shocked to the core, the Doctor races outside – where he sees that every banner, poster and sign - including the lettering on the TARDIS - now reads ‘Bad Wolf’. Rushing inside his time-space ship, the Doctor finds the interior bathed in blood-red light, its Cloister Bell ringing in alarm: the end of the universe is coming…

David Tennant (The Doctor), Catherine Tate (Donna Noble), Billie Piper (Rose Tyler), Bernard Cribbins (Wilfred Mott), Jacqueline King (Sylvia Noble), Joseph Long (Rocco Colasanto), Noma Dumezweni (Captain Erisa Magambo), Chipo Chung (Fortune Teller), Marcia Lecky (Mooki Kahari), Suzann McLean (Veena Brady), Natalie Walter (Alice Coltrane), Neil Clench (Man in pub), Clive Stander (U.N.I.T. Soldier), Bhasker Patel (Jival Chowdry), Catherine York (Female Reporter), Ben Wrighton (Oliver Morgenstern), Loraine Velez, (Spanish Maid), Jason Mohammad (Studio News Reader), Sanchia McCormack (Housing Officer), Lawrence Stevenson (Soldier #1), Terri-Ann Brumby (Woman in Doorway), Lachele Carl (Trinity Wells), Paul Richard Biggin (Soldier #2)

Directed by Graeme Harper
Produced by Susie Liggat
Executive Producers Russell T. Davies and Julie Gardner
A BBC Wales production

TX:
21st June 2008 @ 6.40 pm

Notes:
*Featuring the Tenth Doctor, Donna and Rose

*Bad Wolf sighting: Rose Tyler has returned from the parallel universe...

*As well as David Tennant and Catherine Tate, Billie Piper is also credited in the opening titles

*Working title: ‘Donna’s Nasty Turn’