Prologue.
It was a time of sorrow. A time of loss.
After the end had come, she had drifted for a long, long time, bereft of purpose, and simply bereft.
Finally, she returned to the one place that could, even possibly, be called home.
Then, in her pain and sorrow and loneliness, she fitfully slept.
Time passed. and sometimes, she stirred from her torpor to regard the world blearily...
It seemed the old Police box had always been there, but he'd not really noticed it until now.
Its blue paint cracked and peeling, the box was part embedded in the park railing and wall. As much a part of the scenery as the grass that sprouted in the pavement in front of the battered panels.
He touched the door, and with an incongruous hiss, as though a long-closed seal had been broken, it opened inward.
He stepped inside.
The air was musty. He had an odd sense of space all around, as though he had stepped into a cathedral.
In the blackness, a single green light flashed. He knew the box was no more than six feet deep, but the light appeared to be many yards away.
He moved toward it.
The door snapped closed behind him, a pneumatic sibilance after the closing reverberation. The seal had evidently engaged once more. The echo seemed to be borne away in distance and darkness.
A wave of fear rippled over him and his muscles quivered. He wanted to run.
The single light still blinked. It felt like something was being considered - almost as if his fitness, his worth, was being evaluated.
Then, slowly, the interior began to light up. At first, small lights delineated a console, then hidden illumination began to glow within the walls.
The place was huge. What on earth? Well, not of earth, he could see that.
Then, with a splutter, the chamber was filled with the sound of an engine roaring to life... VWOOOORp! VWOOOORp! VWOOOORp!
His stomach lurched.
He didn't know it yet, but he'd been stolen...