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Chapter 1
Do you know that feeling when you are suddenly dragged into something new, something unexpected, something that turns your world around? Like the announcement of Ben Affleck playing Batman in the next DC movie or that Manuel Neuer signed a treaty at the football club FC Bayern Munich. Something that threatens your believe in the world, like another man beaten to death when he defended a victim of robbery, or another dictator following his father.
But then there are smaller things, things that only are about you, but things much bigger. But what defines the size of an event, I wonder. Funny, what you start to think about. Is it the amount of people involved, is it the location it takes place, is it the order in which those happenings appear in the news? What is subtle, interesting and as well normal and simple enough to be broadcasted. I remembered people telling me about a space ship hitting Big Ben several years ago, I was only a little kid when it happened and I definitely didn't watch the news that day.
As children completely missed the plane crashed at 09/11 or the introduction of a new currency in several countries of the Europpean Union. Did aliens really land on Earth? There were so many events, dating back to the dawn of written history, that are yet unexplained. But on the other hand, storm and thunder were thought creations of a God when he was angry and red hair was a sign of witchcraft.
Things became explainable and I'm sure that in several years, or decades, or centuries, wonders and surprised will be an everyday topic, as are electric light, computer, social networks, news, natural catastrophes.
However one might start to philosophy, some answers are not supposed to be found yet. The hen and her egg, the phoenix and the ash. People never stop and just look into the sky and wonder what might be up there. Farther than we have yet reached, the moon becomes reachable, the Curiosity on Mars, the Voyager travelling where no man has gone before. But can you imagine a human being outside of this solar system, out there in the width of space? I couldn't.
It was a normal day at university. The exam phase was about to begin and students were slowly starting to feel nervous about the topics they all had to learn. It was becoming summer – after a winter we never had, and the temperatures for January were far too high, as the newspaper did not stop to claim. I was just walking home from another one and a half hours listening to a murmuring professor with too much knowledge about his subject but too less knowledge of how to teach it to the sleepy students in the lecture hall, who were either playing with their mobile phones, thanks to free WLAN and full reception in the upper bank rows, watching a newest episode of How I met your mother with iPad and earphones, or reading a novel far more interesting than the dry learning matter that was being transmitted to the huge beamers under the ceiling of the hall.
I had only managed to read two sites of the textbook I borrowed from the library the other day. When finally leaving the modern building, saying good-bye to the fellow students, one could finally enjoy the first warm rays of sun this year. I started walking up the stairs to lead out of the small campus and continued the walk to my little flat to which I had to move at the beginning of this semester.
It has become dark very quickly and with the darkness came the cold. I was closing the last button of my favourite jacket and hurried down the street. I had just walked around the corner and was now unmistakably in a trade area, when it started to become windy, nearly stormy. I closed my eyes, but when I opened them again only little while later, the wind was gone and it was not as dark anymore. When I noticed my own shadow, I turned around to see the light source. My mouth dropped open when a huge blue box had seemed to appear just behind me. On top of it, a white light bulb.
"What the hell...?" I muttered when the door opened suddenly.
A man was stumbling out of it, seeming a bit disoriented at first, but then recognising the surroundings when a device in his hand started to beep and blink. "Oh, hello there," he said when he spotted me. His glance wandered back to the metallic device that looked like being built with the rest of incinerated junkyard stuff. "You didn't coincidentally see a tall, green reptile like creature running around here?" he asked me and had a look around.
I slightly shook my head.
"I didn't think so," he said and walked past me to the flat I was living in. I had a little room in the house, which also contained a flat share, two vets, an estate agent and a small telephone support agency.
"Hey, where're you going?" I asked and quickly ran after him. I've read enough scientific articles to not believe in blue wooden boxes appearing out of nowhere – especially those who looked like police boxes from over 60 years ago. I also did not believe in real aliens, although familiar with the typical sci-fi stuff and of course hoping for a first contact – but rather in 2063 with pointy-eared Vulcans in the downs of Montana's forests.
"Finding the Silurians," the man answered simply. Before I could ask further, he added, "those reptilian-like creatures I was talking about. I met them a while ago and dealt with them but one or two seem to have come back sooner than they should and now they're trying to find their mates."
"How do you know? I mean, are you going to a Star Trek convention, or what?" I wondered loudly.
He quickly turned to me, but then walked on with fast pace. "They sent out a message and my TARDIS received it. Star Trek convention?"
"You know, these gatherings of science fiction geeks dressing up like their favourite heroes. You certainly look like that!"
"What's wrong with my clothes?" he complained and arrived at the green-painted building.
"What did you say, what received this 'message'?" I asked, still thinking I might have landed in one of these reality shows where they muck people by doing nonsense.
"The TARDIS," the man said and wanted to add something, but then finally turned to face me. "Just let me go in there, deal with the Silurians, and then you can go home and sit down in front of TV and watch the colloquial rubbish of news, telling you nothing about what really happens in the universe." He pointed to the sky and I only shook my head. Without another word, he entered the building, whose door was open due to the vet's clients coming and going until late in the night.
I rolled my eyes. Has he just broken out of the psychiatry? I remind myself that there is only a prison nearby – and that guy definitely didn't look like an escapee. On the other hand, you could never know and so I decided to follow him in. He had already rang the door bell at the vet's and I could see one of the receptionists open. I pretended to be walking by and greeted her nicely, only to stop halfway on the staircase and regard what would happen now.
"Hello there, my name is The Doctor and either you or one of your bosses is a Homo Reptilian creature in disguise," this strange man said and pushed the young woman into the room. The door closed and only a little while later I could hear loud screams – belonging, as I believed, to the receptionist.
I'm neither the hero-type nor the most sporty one, especially in winter, but I decided to quickly to think. I put down my bag and put off jacket and my too-long scarf, and rushed down the few stairs. The door had only half closed and I pushed it open, stumbling nearly across the receptionist lying in the main hall. I look up and see one of the vets, but not looking as familiar as she usually did. Her had had gotten an oval form, her hair was lying on the floor like a lost wig, and her skin was bursting apart, revealing dark green scales.
"Oh my God, she's an alien!" I shouted to the man who had searched shelter behind a dog sitting on a table.
"Not an alien, merely an early inhabitant of this planet," he said while this green creature couldn't decide if first to kill me or this stranger. As I did not appear like a threat, she walked towards this man.
I quickly kneed down and although without a medical degree, I felt no pulse of the receptionist. I had never seen a dead body before, but I did not have time to think about it either. This Silurian – or how she was called – slowly walked to this man.
"If you're an alien catcher – excuse me, Homo Reptile catcher, don't you have a weapon or something?" I shout while I already search for something to use. I reach out for the chair next to me, but suddenly I feel something wet and glibbery on my hand and pull it back. I look up and notice that it was the tongue of this alien creature staring at me with her light green eyes. In that moment, the strange man ran up from behind and tapped a blue patch at the Silurians body. She suddenly dematerialised into yellow and orange sparks.
"Did you kill her?" I asked unbelieving.
"No, but transported her right into the court room of the Shadow Proclamation," he said and I was surprised that his face seemed able to smile.
"Okay...I just take it you're some kind of alien hunter on Earth and protecting us people from the things we shouldn't know," I start to realise.
"Well, actually I'm an alien who only accidentally found the distress call of the two Homo Reptilia when travelling close to these space-time coordinates."
"Right – two Homo whatever?" I ask and turn around. The first thing I notice was the dog. Or rather that it was not there anymore. But another green creature rising from behind the table. "Okay, what now?" I ask while the green 'person' began to look less and less likable.
The stranger thought for a moment, sighed and then grabbed my hand, "run!" he shouted and before I could blink, he pulled me out of the room, back into the hallway and out of the building. It was dark now and the street lamps were shining with their yellow colour.
"Where're we going?" I screamed when I notice the Silurian right behind us.
"Back to my ship. The Shadow Proclamation has these space-time coordinates now, they'll send someone to catch this Silurian," he explained.
"And that is your ship?" I ask looking at the wooden box.
"Don't worry, it's bigger on the inside," he shouted and fumbled out his key.
Before I could realise what he said, I already stumbled into the box – and was astonished that I did not bump against the opposite wall. "But, it's bigger on the inside," I said and slowly looked around.
"Close the doors behind you."
I did and noticed the Silurian banging against them. "So...this is your spaceship – and you are an alien, I assume."
"You assume right," he answered and walked to the console-like 'thing' in the middle of the huge room.
"Okay...," I say slowly and regard the decoration. Not quite my style and these controls look like ripped off the studio of the TV series Space Patrol Orion. Not as science-fiction-heavy as I would have expected. "So you fly through time and space – and do what?"
"I don't know really. But things always start to evolve. It's never boring – unless, of course, you're travelling alone," he said and typed in some commands into this console.
"Oh, that's what you do. Bounce from one adventure into another, pick up young girls 'by coincidence' and then ask them to come with you. Nice strategy. Did anyone ever say no?"
"Yes, some did."
"And did some say yes?"
"Yes, some did."
"And where are they now? And who are you? What, why...?" I asked and turned around again. I could not believe this. I, of all persons in this world, stumbled into an alien race and met this incredibly mad guy with his wooden police box. Why me?
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