Prologue (TV story)

Prologue is a mini-episode that serves as a prequel to the first episode of The Doctor's first series.

Synopsis
''The Doctor learns Donna Noble's meta-crisis powers are returning. He enlists the help of Jack Harkness and River Song to keep his friend safe. Elsewhere, an old enemy decides to use Donna's unstable Time Lord abilities for a nefarious purpose.''

Plot
The Woman's face appears on a television screen in Donna Noble's bedroom. Donna tosses and turns in her bed. As she does, meta-crisis energy escapes from her mouth and flies out her open bedroom window. It vanishes into the night. 1,500 light-years away from Earth, the Doctor's TARDIS materializes on the Ood Sphere.

The Eleventh Doctor emerges. He finds Ood Sigma waiting for him, and he complains his trip to the moon has been interrupted. Ood Sigma ignores this and asks the Doctor to follow him. The Doctor does so.

Ood Sigma takes the Doctor to the Elder Ood, and it is revealed the DoctorDonna is returning for an unknown reason. The Doctor realizes Donna Noble's life is in danger, and he rushes back to his TARDIS. It vanishes from the Ood Sphere.

The Doctor's TARDIS rematerializes in the Zaggit Zaggoo bar. There, Jack Harkness struggles to cope with a broken heart; Alonso Frame has stood him up. The Doctor approaches Jack, recruits him to keep Donna safe, and departs once again.

At the Library, River Song punches the Tenth Doctor, knocking him out. The Eleventh Doctor appears and asks River to help Jack protect Donna. When River obliges, she is taken to Earth to rendezvous with Jack. The Doctor reminds her she must return and face death once she has fulfilled her new duties.

With Donna's safety assured, the Doctor visits his sleeping ex-companion and wishes her well. He leaves behind a piece of coral-like material and departs in his TARDIS to pick up his new friend, Amy Pond. Donna is awakened by the sound of the disappearing TARDIS's engines, but she quickly falls back asleep.

On the Ood Sphere, a mysterious man stabs and kills the Elder Ood. He claims the DoctorDonna's powers will be his.

Cast

 * The Woman - Claire Bloom
 * Donna Noble - Catherine Tate
 * The Eleventh Doctor - Matt Smith
 * Ood Sigma - Paul Kasey
 * Voice of Ood Sigma - Silas Carson
 * Elder Ood - Ruari Mears
 * Voice of Elder Ood - Brian Cox
 * Captain Jack Harkness - John Barrowman
 * The Tenth Doctor - David Tennant
 * River Song - Alex Kingston
 * The Master - Alan Cumming

Crew

 * Written by - The Time Lord

Story notes

 * This mini-episode reveals the events of One Enchanted Evening were a dream Jack Harkness had while coping with his heartbreak.
 * In The End of Time and other stories, the Doctor states he cannot cross his timeline. When the TARDIS takes him to the Library so he can recruit River Song, it gets around this by materializing at a point in which the Tenth Doctor is unconscious and thus can have no knowledge of his future self's arrival.
 * In The Time of Angels, River Song is amused that the Doctor does not know her yet. He actually does due to the events of this mini-episode, but because he must preserve the timeline, he avoids responding to River directly.
 * Normally, the events of River Song's past are those of the Doctor's future. In this mini-episode, when the Doctor returns to the Library to recruit River, he does so by going into his past, which is her future.
 * The scene in which the Doctor visits Donna Noble as she sleeps mirrors one from The Big Bang that features seven-year-old Amy Pond.
 * The Doctor places a surviving, coral-like piece of his TARDIS's old console room on Donna Noble's nightstand. This can become a new TARDIS and was originally featured in a deleted scene from Journey's End.
 * In this mini-episode's script, the Master is only referred to as "Man."

Continuity

 * The Doctor learns about Donna Noble's returning meta-crisis powers over the course of a trip he takes to break in his fully-recovered TARDIS's new engines. (TV: The Eleventh Hour)
 * Jack Harkness is stood up by Alonso Frame after the Tenth Doctor helps the two meet. (TV: The End of Time)
 * The Eleventh Doctor appears before River Song after she incapacitates his previous self with a swift blow to the jaw. (TV: Forest of the Dead)