The Key Lost and Found
The Doctor leaned back against the TARDIS, watching people as they hurried by. It had been quiet enough on the street at 4am for him to sneak in, but now the work rush had begun and he would have to wait until nightfall to leave. He'd popped back to Earth to make sure all was well and for once, it was.
He was about to leave when he felt something weird. A strange prickling sensation on the back of his neck. What the…? He spun around to search for the source. People bustled past, on cell phones and fancy suits and skirts, but across the street his gaze settled on one person. A girl, dark blonde hair streaked golden by the sun. She strode forward, determined, strong, with a large black hiking backpack on her shoulders. Why did she have that pack? Was she the one giving him that odd feeling? There were so many people? She looked up and glance at her surroundings before he eyes locked with his. She kept walking, but held his gaze. She seemed curious and then looked to her other side for a moment and then simply marched on.
The Doctor looked in the direction she had and at once was glad and dejected. Martha stood with her husband by the fountain, laughing and fending off his playful advances. It must have been Martha's presence that alerted him. The last thing she needed was to see him again like a ghost.
So that's what he decided to become and slipped away into the crowd to find something to occupy his time until nightfall. He heard a little jingle behind him, like metal on concrete, but kept walking. Someone must have dropped some change.
--
All around Nick, the babble of people rushing to the office, yakking on phones, mouths half-filled with bagel, and the clack of heels against pavement filled her ears. Her hiking boots were in rebellion with the noise, a heavy thud, thud rising from them instead. She added an extra spring in one step to resettle her 60 pound pack. It carried everything she owned; clothes for all seasons, small propane stove, sleeping bag, compass, tent, water, food, and more. She doubted London would have a place to pitch a tent, but she doubted she had enough money to rent a hotel room. Her last odd job hadn't paid much, and she'd used a lot just to get to the city.
Oh well, being here is enough, she thought. After all, this wouldn't be the first time things had gotten a bit sticky. She remembered Russia and the nasty weather that had hit. She shivered. I'll find something here, she assured herself.
An abrupt prickling sensation on the back of her neck made her shrug the pack around, but the feeling didn't go away. What the…? The old instinct—it felt like someone was watching her. She glanced around before catching the eye of someone. A man across the street in a brown trench coat, his hands shoved into the pockets. He stared at her with an odd kind of intensity, as though he were trying to figure something out. He was kind of cute—brown hair that flipped around a bit in the breeze, a boyish face, yet, somehow, not young. Weird. Is he really looking at me or…?
She turned her head to her left but only saw a pretty woman with dark skin laughing with what was probably her boyfriend. Nick shrugged and kept moving. Maybe the guy was an unhappy ex-boyfriend.
When she looked back again, he was gone. It was then she realized he'd been standing in front of a blue Police Box.
Weird, she thought again, but made a note of it in case she ran out of options when night came.
--
"Ugh. Nine o'clock and I need to get out of these boots," Nick muttered to herself. She was right about the tent—a person couldn't just pitch one in the middle of a major metropolitan city. As was the case, she'd returned to the blue Police Box. She had the feeling that later on during the night if someone came by to use it, she'd get yelled at and ushered out. Oh well. A few hours sleep is all I want right now. Two hour patches of sleep weren't anything new either.
Nick flexed her shoulders, ready to shed the pack. She pushed against the doors. They didn't move.
"Oh man," she moaned and stared up at the sign. "Public my ass. Great." She pushed a few times more, but the doors refused to budge.
She sighed, unsure of what to do next. This had been her last plan. She took a step back and her food came down on something that made a jingling noise as it squeaked away from the boot's rubber edge. She looked down. In the dim light a little tarnished key glinted up at her. For a few minutes she only stared at it. No way… She picked it up and turned it over in her fingers. No way it could be that easy.
"This isn't going to work," she mumbled as she fitted the key in the lock. "I'm just kidding myself. There is no way this key actually goes to—"
It turned, clicked, and the door opened a crack. Nick took at the key and held it in a tight fist.
"Yes!"
She bounded inside and started to swing the door shut behind her. At the last second she stopped. Frozen in her tracks, her mouth dropped open as she gazed around in wonder.
It was a room, a huge room. It didn't match the tiny box outside. Parts of it looked like massive inorganic tree branches, rising up to hold the place together. The floor looked like normal, everyday metal grating. Other parts, the bulbous lights and bizarre center column with panels filled with wires and knobs and switches and levers and weird sea green lighting definitely were not normal.
I did just step into a box right? Maybe her eyes had deceived her. Maybe it wasn't a box. Maybe it was a tricky kind of paint job that made the box seem 3D when it was actually just flat on a building. Except it wasn't on a building—it was right on the sidewalk, I remember that!
She stepped forward cautiously and cleared her throat, making the sound loud and obvious. Nothing responded.
Any normal person would have left by now, she told herself. Yeah, too bad I'm not normal.
"Anyone here?" she called. No answer. Famous last words of people who get killed and eaten by aliens.
She crept up to the panel, looking, but not touching. No way was she going to touch anything in here. It didn't have a dangerous or threatening feel to it, but it certainly wasn't human. She examined what seemed to be controls. How many people does it take to operate this thing—whatever it is? Six? Three? One creature with multiple arms? No. Something like that couldn't be walking around in the middle of London. Unless, of course, it was a shapeshifter…or a body snatcher.
Nick began to consider leaving when she thought she heard something outside and dove over the side rail, hitting hard her side and managing to scoot over under the grate floor with great difficulty. With deft hands she loosened the straps and freed the buckles, shoving it ahead of her and curling up next to it.
Oh God, I am so screwed.
