Lauren was staring out her window at the farm across the street. The ground was frozen and the white snow was reflecting the sun light from above. Lauren looked at her clock again; 6:30. Her guests wouldn't be there for another half an hour, but she was already anxious to get the New Year's Eve party underway. There would be food, and friends, and they'd stay up all night talking; her parties were famous for gorging and gossiping.
The 22 year-old let the curtain swing back in front of the windows and went back downstairs to check on the appetizers she was making. When she returned to the window to see if any of her friends had arrived early, she noticed something that normally wasn't there; an odd blue box was sitting at the end of her driveway. Lauren threw on her coat and ran outside to inspect the box. It sat lightly on the snow, almost as if it wasn't even touching it, and it looked just like an old fashioned police call box from London. She reached out to touch the smooth painted wood, but as soon as her fingers touched it, the door swung inward and a tall, thin man was standing before her, "Hello there." The man said with a thick English accent as he stepped out of the blue box. He stuffed his hands into the pockets of his brown coat and strode off in the direction of the light poles that lined the entry-drive across from Lauren's house.
The breeze was ruffling his messy brown hair and he didn't seem bothered at all by the snow and the cold, "Who are you and what are you doing here?" Lauren asked warily, drawing her coat around her small frame and setting her hazel eyes hard on the strange man. Her brunette bangs were falling in her eyes and she resisted the urge to break her stare to push them away.
"Oh, I'm The Doctor." The man smiled in an extremely attractive way and pulled out a thin silver object. He began waving the object over one of the poles and the little silver instrument glowed a bright blue and whirred slightly, "Huh. That's weird; I could've sworn they were here a minute ago."
"What were here?" But the Doctor wasn't listening, he was returning to his box, "Hey!" Lauren ran after him and grabbed him by the arm, "Why won't you answer my questions?"
"Because," The Doctor's tone suggested the answer to the question was extremely obvious, "You don't need to know the answer. Your mind would be blown by the sheer magnitude of the answers to all your questions. And no," he guessed her next question, "I'm not going to explain that." He pulled his arm from her grip and slipped into his machine.
Lauren slammed her fists onto the door of the box, but was blown back by a wind as the blue box slowly disappeared; the noise coming from it was mix between a car refusing to start and a cat screeching with its vocal cords clipped. It was a weird noise.
Lauren was standing alone in the snow now and the biting wind was starting to get to her, but she refused to go back inside. She wanted the man to come back; to explain himself and so she could yell at him for trespassing on her property. But, mostly, there was just something about the man that intrigued her. Something that made her want to figure him out. She was staring at the place the box had been and was startled when a horn honked behind her.
Lauren's friend Heather stuck her head out of her little white car, "What are doing standing in the freezing cold?"
Lauren crawled into the passenger's seat, "Nothing. It was nothing."
Heather just shook her head and drove them both up the long driveway and into a spare garage. The warmth of the house was inviting and Lauren sat immediately down in front of the fireplace to calm her shivers and Heather came to sit next to her, "So my doctor said everything is normal and healthy and my due date should be sometime in June." Heather smiled brightly. She and her husband had found out recently that she was expecting their first child, and that's all she could talk about anymore. The baby this, and the baby that. Lauren was glad she didn't have that responsibility; she was looking for any excuse to get out of Nebraska, not to get tied down to it.
Lauren just nodded her head and stared into the flames; who was that man? Where did he come from? And why had he been here, at her Nebraskan home? Her train of questions was interrupted by a doorbell and soon, all thoughts of The Doctor were pushed from her mind as more and more of her guests began to arrive and the party got underway. But soon, they were all fast asleep in the living room and the clock struck 2 AM.
And the noise was back; ringing clear through the still night and causing Lauren to bolt upright and jump out of her sleeping bag. She threw her jeans on and pulled on a sweatshirt and tennis shoes before bolting as quietly as possible out the door and down the driveway. Sure enough, at the very end sat a mysterious blue box and The Doctor standing next to it. But something was different, and Lauren knew right away what that was.
Eight or nine tiny, pitch black creatures with scales and claws that shone in the moonlight reflected from the snow were scurrying around and trying very hard to push over one of the lamp-posts. Not trying, succeeding. The lamp-post fell to the ground in a spark of wires being torn and puff of loose snow. The small creatures were laughing in high, nasally voices as they scurried over to the next lamp-post, "Hey!" Lauren cried out, causing the creatures to turn towards her, "Those are expensive, leaved them alone!" She started to charge forward to challenge the creatures, but The Doctor put out an arm to stop her.
"Do not get too close to them." He said slowly and quietly. The creatures slowly crept closer and closer, until one lunged out at the two of them and the others followed suit. Lauren resisted the scream that was building up in her lungs, and took a few steps backward, "Batter up!" The Doctor yelled and swung the small, silver object from before at the little black monster, stopping it when it faced the creature and the blue light flickered to life. As soon as the light hit the creature, it dropped to the snow and lay still; dead.
The Doctor took out two more of the monsters, before one blind-sided him and knocked him to the ground, the silver weapon sliding across the frozen driveway and out of his reach, "Doctor!" Lauren cried out and started to run to him. But before she fully got there, she slipped on a patch of ice and fell; hard. She skid across the rough ice and when she stopped, her left fore-arm was cut and bleeding and her head hurt badly. The Doctor was still fighting off the small creatures and looked to be losing that battle. Lauren looked around and saw the silver object sitting close to her. She grabbed it and started feeling around for a button that would turn it on; the pain in her arm growing stronger by the minute. Finally, the object turned on. Following The Doctor's lead, Lauren stood and cautiously, but quickly, crossed to where the creatures were. She held the object out at arm's length and pointed the blue light at the attacking things. One by one, they slid off the strange man and soon, he was free and all the creatures were killed.
"Not bad," The Doctor said approvingly, "Not bad at all for never having used a sonic screwdriver before."
"A what?" Lauren loved and hated talking to this man; his sentences confused her, but she was intrigued to hear more.
"A sonic screwdriver. The thing you're holding," He took the screwdriver from and pocketed it, "What's your name?"
"Lauren Masely. What were those things?" She asked.
"Gremlins. Nasty little buggers. They jump through space –windows and wreak havoc on humans. They do things such as tear down lamp-posts, break expensive items, and crawl into theater light-boards and cause problems. It's like, a hobby or something. Like stamp collecting." The Doctor was talking as if this all made sense.
"Space-windows? You mean they're not from Earth?"
"Bingo. They're from a planet just north of here called Greylek. And sometimes a space-window opens up and up to ten Gremlins will pop out onto Earth and do some damage. Once to window closes, they disappear here and end up back on Greylek." The Doctor was looking around at the area around the lamp-posts to make sure there weren't any more Gremlins.
"But what causes a space-window?" Lauren took a step closer; she wanted to know everything about this man.
"Global warming is a half-myth. You're not creating a whole in the ozone when you burn fossil fuel, you're creating a whole in space. Then anything can get through once it finds the hole." Lauren didn't know why, but she believed him. She should've suggested that he check into a mental institute, but instead, she believed him, "Well, I must be off. Got bigger fish to fry." The Doctor headed back into his box and left Lauren standing alone again.
But instead of going back inside like she should have, Lauren made a quick, spur-of-the-moment decision and she pushed the door of the box open. She stepped inside and was amazed by what she saw. The box was BIGGER on the INSIDE! The vast space that she was standing in was unbelievable, but yet, obviously possible. The Doctor had his back to the door, so he didn't see that Lauren was inside his box; he was too busy pushing buttons and pulling levers to notice.
Soon, the noise that the box always makes was whirring outside and Lauren knew she was being taken somewhere. The Doctor turned around and when he saw her, his eyes began to panic, "What are you doing in here?"
